Skid Row

It snowed the other day…it caught us by surprise. Usually, here in Arkansas, we have several days notice and if even ONE flake falls, it is apparently a state law to head to the local grocery store and buy up all the bread and milk even if the next day’s forecast is 52 and sunny. It is a deep, deep fear to be stranded in a house with 3 kids and  no food and no power from a snowstorm. I’ve actually BEEN stranded in our shack of a house  in the snow with no power as a child and we put old bread sacks over our shoes and walked to my Granny Viv’s because she ALWAYS had food and we hauled it home on a sled and ate for days. So, I understand this urge. Perhaps it is in our DNA…us southerners…to hoard and pack up and batten down. There’s really no need for it now, but still we do it.

I stepped out of the first chicken house, hands full of dead baby chickens. The ground was already dusted white and it was coming down hard. I threw the dead chickens in a bucket and got inside the farm truck and called Clint.

“were we supposed to get snow?” I asked. “no, I don’t think so. Why?” he said. “cause it’s snowing like gangbusters here!” I said.

“Well, it’s not snowing here.” he told me. “Be careful in that snow! Don’t get stuck in it.”

He said the last part sternly, almost fatherly. This is, dear reader, a part of our relationship that just is what it is. He is a little older than me (6 years). He is old fashioned and polite. He is protective. I am….well….flighty at times. I chatter and talk. I giggle. So, it is what it is. Some people don’t understand it. I do. He do. We do. Now, y’all do.

I went back to walking chickens and  by the time I was done (this batch of chickens I SWEAR is gonna do me IN, they are AWFUL and they are PUNY and SICKLY and look like twitchy alien facsimiles of baby chicks  and were awful the day they BROUGHT them and I’m trying my BEST to make chicken soup out of chicken POOP but let me tell you, it’s a BOOGER and I’m tired and a little bit CRANKY about the whole mess)

 So, it was a while before I got back outside and the whole earth was white. Soft, fluffy, white. Crunchy, perfect snow. Snow stuck to my eyelashes. Melted on my face. I drove the farm truck down the chicken house pad that is lower and sloping and graveled. Then, I did it.

I stomped on the gas and roared over the snow. The back end of the one ton lost control almost immediately like trucks are want to do.  The back end of the truck came around my left. I was sideways, sliding, engine roaring. I grabbed the steering wheel and turned it gently left, feeling when to straighten it or turn it more left again. This is “steering into the skid” and I LOVE it and I would lose control, gain control, lose, gain, lose, gain. Out of control. In control.  I romped on the gas again, skidding and sliding, turning into it gently and catching myself. I did this for ten minutes, until I had tracked up a good portion of the chicken house pad.

The first time I skidded out of control, I was 16. Driving home in the rain from work, I lost control and almost slid into the ditch. I managed to get control back by steering into it. That is how I learned.

We taught this to our kids, made them drive and lose control in the pasture or on the chicken house pad. They loved it and became adept at it. Tara looked funny, so tiny…feet barely reaching the pedals as I said “ok, now STOMP it!!!! ok…now…..we’re sliding!!! Turn into it NOW!!!!” she would get control back and want to do it again. Trevor would do it on the four wheeler….in the trucks….anything.

I called Clint and told him about the countless sick chickens I picked up and how sorry they were and how mad I was about it all. Then I said “but I got to tear up the chicken house pad!” “I knew it!” he said. “you can’t resist. You’re like a little kid sometimes.” I giggled.

I went home and took a hot shower, pondering skidding and sliding. Dear reader…it’s a marvelous thing to skid, to slide…ever marvelouser to take yourself OUT of it. It’s ok to skid or slide if it’s your idea…it’s not if it’s out of your control

There are people who try to make me lose control…to watch me slide helplessly. I’ve learned to meet them head on and turn into them so they can see my eyes and my smile. I steer into the skid, gaining control back, getting my feet back under me, feeling gravel crunch and the wheels just CATCH and then POOF! I’m back in the driver’s seat, in control once more.

When I feel that slide, that skid, that sense of control being lost….I turn into it. I turn to God and just meet it HEAD ON.

I drove up to check chickens a few hours later. I noticed Trevor’s truck was at his house, meaning he was off work. I chugged up the driveway and when I got to the chicken house pad, I saw tracks.

Tire tracks. Big, looping circles and skids, gravel thrown across the snow.

“did I do all THAT??” I thought.

Then, I looked closer.

My truck has dual tires, hence leaving  2 pairs of tire tracks. The vehicle that left these tracks  only had one pair. I noted that the front end of the tracks was deeper, the tires digging in for purchase in the new snow. The sliding, out of control  back set barely scuffed the surface.

Aha.

I called Clint and told him what I saw. “Trev’s been up here skidding around in the snow on the chicken house pad.” I said. “well…” Clint drawled. “wonder where he got THAT??” “I have no idea.” I said in my best southern drawl.

I drove around the tire tracks left in the snow by my son in his green truck, the truck we bought him when he was 16, that he bought back after he sold it…. the looping, scrawling, sprawling tracks. I thought about  us teaching him to drive and steering into the skids.

Dear reader…

steer into the skid.  Meet it head on. Grab that out of control moment and for ONCE take control.  Grab the wheel and gauge the road, feel the truck beneath you obey your command.

I’m happy to teach you how.

 Next snowfall.

You.

Me.

 My farm truck.

Let the giggling commence.

Deer Reader :)

We’ve started a new bible study at my church, just us ladies. It’s about being a Godly woman and doing Godly, womanly things. It’s a good study and I’m enjoying it.

My life is different than most women I know. I have other female friends that have chicken houses, but their husbands stay home with them and they work together for the most part. In our world, I stay home and Clint goes to work and unless I’ve got a problem I rarely want him out there. He has so much to do and is so busy, I feel it a burden to ask him to do much in the chicken houses.  That being said, sometimes there are things I CANNOT do physically or are out of my comfort zone to fix. I can’t fix vent door cables. I know HOW to fix them, but physically I’m not strong enough. I’m good at trouble shooting and often can call Clint and tell him exactly what’s wrong and even what parts he may need to pick up.

 Sometimes my days blur between being a girly girl and being a tomboy. Saturday morning, I got up and worked out. Clint was gone hunting and I don’t have chickens right now. So, I made a big pot of homemade cream of tomato soup, homemade potato soup, and homemade pimento cheese. I cooked and I cooked. Then I cleaned and I cleaned. I painted old furniture and then distressed it to look old and beat up. I love things that look old and beat up. I like to tell Clint that’s why I love him and he just laughs. 

  Clint came home with a buck he had shot and I took my camera out there and snapped a few proud pictures. Aaron was there, a young man who came home with Trevor one day after school several years ago and just seemed to never completely leave. Clint and I feel like he is a stepson at this point. He comes for Sunday dinner pretty regularly and calls Clint to ask for advice or chat. Clint went into the shop and Aaron grabbed all four legs of the buck and heaved it out of the bed of the pickup. Aaron is a big, strong guy but the buck’s head just wouldn’t clear the tail gate so, I grabbed the antlers and helped Aaron carry it into the shop. I watched as Clint cut behind the tendons just above the back hooves and ran a hook thru them. They hoisted the buck into the air with the chain lift. Clint placed a piece of wood about a foot and a half across with wedges cut out of it between the buck’s back legs to hold them apart. It had already been gutted. He grabbed the hose and began washing the blood and grass and hair that had stuck to the inner part of the deer. The water and blood ran into the drain in the floor of the shop.  The dogs sniffed and snuffed the air. I watched as he cut around the white tail of the deer and  started to skin it. I’ve helped to skin many deer, but Aaron was there so I left it to him. “When y’all are done, I’ve got soup and pimento cheese and pound cake.”

Clint smiled at me, his camo splatted here and there with blood. “you’re a good woman. She’s a good woman, huh, Aaron? She’s a good cook, too.” Aaron smiled and agreed and said “I know.” I grinned at them and said “y’all just holler when you’re ready to eat.” and I headed inside the house.

I washed the blood off my hands and set about to painting again and cleaning. After finishing up with the deer,  Clint came in and ate and said he was going to take a nap. We’d both been fighting allergies/colds all week. I rarely nap. I actually dislike naps and always have. But I found the nap idea intriguing for some reason, so I lay down on the bed beside him  and fell asleep almost immediately.

I woke an hour later, confused and stupid. This is why I hate naps. I wake up confused and stupid every time and it doesn’t wear off for an hour.

I got up quietly and slipped out, Clint’s snore a steady sound. I puttered around the house til he got up.

We sat quietly and visited until his phone vibrated. He answered it and had a short conversation.

He stood up and said “well, that was Greg, he and his wife saw a deer limping across the pasture. Said it was limping pretty bad. It may have been shot or hit by a car. Either way, it’s limping and hurt.  Wanna  go with me and see if it needs put down?”

I got up and changed shoes. Clint dressed me in an orange vest and frowned at my pale pink ball cap and pulled it off and put on a hunter’s orange one. “I don’t look good in orange” I jokingly protested. “I’m a winter.” He sighed like he always does and we climbed into the truck.

We headed down the road, just across from our old house. The house we lived in when we first married and brought the babies home to. I always look at it if I drive by. It’s so full of memories of early years. I half expect to see Trevor or Tara, ages 6 and 4, playing on the carport. They are never there except in my mind.

We parked and got out and headed into the pasture. Clint got his rifle out in case he had to put the deer down. Many round bales of hay dotted here and there. We whispered to each other quietly about where this deer might be. I said “if I were a deer, and I was hurt, I’d get in the shade, and hide under a tree.” Clint said “yup.” I said “don’t deer head for water when they’re hurt?” “yup.” said Clint. “ooh, I bet it’s down there, there’s a creek and it’d be cool and a good hiding place!” I said excitedly.  Clint said “yup.” then he added “ Shhhhh. Don’t talk. Walk quieter.”

We walked along side by side and I said “this is a nice evening for a walk!” Clint agreed. I reached to take his hand, as if we were on a lover’s lane or walking in a store. He said “sweetie, I gotta have my hands free in case I have to shoot.”

I sighed. I forgot we weren’t just walking and  I have trouble being quiet. I tried. I saw in the distance the trees, the inside of the woods dark and cool, inviting. I started walked toward it, sure that’s where a hurt deer would go.

“would you slow DOWN??” Clint said. “you walk too fast. You have to slip around.” I sighed again. I cannot slip around. But I tried.

Finally we got to where we thought the deer might be and I slowed, looking carefully into the brush. Clint walked on ahead about 30 feet and did the same, slowly peering and peeking. I took a step into the beginning of the brush, feeling sure the deer was near me. Clint got my attention and said in a whisper “if it’s wounded, it might try to hurt you if you get too close. Be careful!” I nodded and took another step. I could see the creek. I could see the slope of the bank, the large dead trees lying here and there, pushed by  past flood waters. It was beautiful. If I were an injured deer, this is where I’d rest, in the shade, near the cool water.  

I heard the deer before I saw it, just 15 or 20 feet in front of me. It was a small doe. She scrambled to her feet and turned away from me and then she just LEAPT over the barb wire fence behind the creek. She seemed to hang in the air for a moment, her tail a white flag, her feet elegantly tucked up, her tiny hooves black and shiny. Her eyes were dark, and big, and full of fear. Her ears, one angled toward me to listen, to see if I would follow. Her fur, smooth and brown and beautiful. She leapt over the fence, out of the shade and into the sun.

And then she was gone.

Clint tried to track her for a while, but she was nowhere to be found. “I knew that’s where she was! I had a feeling!” I said.

“you and your feelings!” he smiled at me. He shook his head. “Well….I was RIGHT.” I smiled back. “you were.” he said.

We headed back to the truck, the long walk across the pasture in our orange vests and hats. I was hot and sweaty and so was he. This time when I took his hand, he didn’t scold me and we walked hand in hand toward the truck.

People drove by on the highway near the pasture and I thought how strange we must look, these hunters holding hands, dressed in orange vests and hats.

We drove home and I thought about that doe, leaping like that. Even though she was hurt. She summoned enough strength and ignored her pain enough to save her life, to keep from being put down.  

I told Clint she didn’t look like she was hurt that bad. He said she’d probably be alright if she could jump like that.

I thought about being a Godly woman. How my life, the girly girl part and the tomboy part, blurs and crosses back and forth. One minute I’m making soup. The next minute, I’m hoisting a dead buck by the antlers. One minute, I’m dressed for church. The next minute, I’m running barefoot thru a flood, fully made up for church, having kicked my shoes off so not to ruin them, in the chicken houses trying to find where the water is coming from. One minute, I’m driving my pastor’s wife (Susie, who made brownies and has them carefully covered in Saran Wrap on a plate and holds them in her lap)  to a bible study. The next minute, I’m pulling into the church parking lot and leaping from the car, screaming STOP IT, STOP HITTING THAT GIRL, NOT IN MY CHURCH PARKING LOT OR YOU’LL HAVE TO FIGHT ME TOO SO HELP ME GOD  at  a young man who is shoving his girlfriend around, chest bumping her, raising his forearm to knock her in the side of the head.   (Susie never even drops the brownies, so stunned is she.)

God made us both, He made male and female. We are both made in His image. Clint is tough and manly, but he is tender and sweet with babies and small children and me. I am soft and curvy, but do a man’s job in the chicken houses. Clint zigs where I zag and I rise when he falls and he lifts when I feel put down.

 I thought about that doe, elegant  and tiny footed, her lean, beautiful face as she leapt into the sunlight, regardless of her pain. 

I want to be like that.

Tender, but tough.

Delicate, but durable.

Injured, yet inspiring.

“As the deer panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, oh God.” Psalm 42:1

Oh dear (deer?) reader. Injured you may be, seek the cool of the shade by the brook. His living water is there, to quench your panting soul.

And never, ever let the world put you down.

Deer Reader :)

We’ve started a new bible study at my church, just us ladies. It’s about being a Godly woman and doing Godly, womanly things. It’s a good study and I’m enjoying it.

My life is different than most women I know. I have other female friends that have chicken houses, but their husbands stay home with them and they work together for the most part. In our world, I stay home and Clint goes to work and unless I’ve got a problem I rarely want him out there. He has so much to do and is so busy, I feel it a burden to ask him to do much in the chicken houses.  That being said, sometimes there are things I CANNOT do physically or are out of my comfort zone to fix. I can’t fix vent door cables. I know HOW to fix them, but physically I’m not strong enough. I’m good at trouble shooting and often can call Clint and tell him exactly what’s wrong and even what parts he may need to pick up.

 Sometimes my days blur between being a girly girl and being a tomboy. Saturday morning, I got up and worked out. Clint was gone hunting and I don’t have chickens right now. So, I made a big pot of homemade cream of tomato soup, homemade potato soup, and homemade pimento cheese. I cooked and I cooked. Then I cleaned and I cleaned. I painted old furniture and then distressed it to look old and beat up. I love things that look old and beat up. I like to tell Clint that’s why I love him and he just laughs. 

  Clint came home with a buck he had shot and I took my camera out there and snapped a few proud pictures. Aaron was there, a young man who came home with Trevor one day after school several years ago and just seemed to never completely leave. Clint and I feel like he is a stepson at this point. He comes for Sunday dinner pretty regularly and calls Clint to ask for advice or chat. Clint went into the shop and Aaron grabbed all four legs of the buck and heaved it out of the bed of the pickup. Aaron is a big, strong guy but the buck’s head just wouldn’t clear the tail gate so, I grabbed the antlers and helped Aaron carry it into the shop. I watched as Clint cut behind the tendons just above the back hooves and ran a hook thru them. They hoisted the buck into the air with the chain lift. Clint placed a piece of wood about a foot and a half across with wedges cut out of it between the buck’s back legs to hold them apart. It had already been gutted. He grabbed the hose and began washing the blood and grass and hair that had stuck to the inner part of the deer. The water and blood ran into the drain in the floor of the shop.  The dogs sniffed and snuffed the air. I watched as he cut around the white tail of the deer and  started to skin it. I’ve helped to skin many deer, but Aaron was there so I left it to him. “When y’all are done, I’ve got soup and pimento cheese and pound cake.”

Clint smiled at me, his camo splatted here and there with blood. “you’re a good woman. She’s a good woman, huh, Aaron? She’s a good cook, too.” Aaron smiled and agreed and said “I know.” I grinned at them and said “y’all just holler when you’re ready to eat.” and I headed inside the house.

I washed the blood off my hands and set about to painting again and cleaning. After finishing up with the deer,  Clint came in and ate and said he was going to take a nap. We’d both been fighting allergies/colds all week. I rarely nap. I actually dislike naps and always have. But I found the nap idea intriguing for some reason, so I lay down on the bed beside him  and fell asleep almost immediately.

I woke an hour later, confused and stupid. This is why I hate naps. I wake up confused and stupid every time and it doesn’t wear off for an hour.

I got up quietly and slipped out, Clint’s snore a steady sound. I puttered around the house til he got up.

We sat quietly and visited until his phone vibrated. He answered it and had a short conversation.

He stood up and said “well, that was Greg, he and his wife saw a deer limping across the pasture. Said it was limping pretty bad. It may have been shot or hit by a car. Either way, it’s limping and hurt.  Wanna  go with me and see if it needs put down?”

I got up and changed shoes. Clint dressed me in an orange vest and frowned at my pale pink ball cap and pulled it off and put on a hunter’s orange one. “I don’t look good in orange” I jokingly protested. “I’m a winter.” He sighed like he always does and we climbed into the truck.

We headed down the road, just across from our old house. The house we lived in when we first married and brought the babies home to. I always look at it if I drive by. It’s so full of memories of early years. I half expect to see Trevor or Tara, ages 6 and 4, playing on the carport. They are never there except in my mind.

We parked and got out and headed into the pasture. Clint got his rifle out in case he had to put the deer down. Many round bales of hay dotted here and there. We whispered to each other quietly about where this deer might be. I said “if I were a deer, and I was hurt, I’d get in the shade, and hide under a tree.” Clint said “yup.” I said “don’t deer head for water when they’re hurt?” “yup.” said Clint. “ooh, I bet it’s down there, there’s a creek and it’d be cool and a good hiding place!” I said excitedly.  Clint said “yup.” then he added “ Shhhhh. Don’t talk. Walk quieter.”

We walked along side by side and I said “this is a nice evening for a walk!” Clint agreed. I reached to take his hand, as if we were on a lover’s lane or walking in a store. He said “sweetie, I gotta have my hands free in case I have to shoot.”

I sighed. I forgot we weren’t just walking and  I have trouble being quiet. I tried. I saw in the distance the trees, the inside of the woods dark and cool, inviting. I started walked toward it, sure that’s where a hurt deer would go.

“would you slow DOWN??” Clint said. “you walk too fast. You have to slip around.” I sighed again. I cannot slip around. But I tried.

Finally we got to where we thought the deer might be and I slowed, looking carefully into the brush. Clint walked on ahead about 30 feet and did the same, slowly peering and peeking. I took a step into the beginning of the brush, feeling sure the deer was near me. Clint got my attention and said in a whisper “if it’s wounded, it might try to hurt you if you get too close. Be careful!” I nodded and took another step. I could see the creek. I could see the slope of the bank, the large dead trees lying here and there, pushed by  past flood waters. It was beautiful. If I were an injured deer, this is where I’d rest, in the shade, near the cool water.  

I heard the deer before I saw it, just 15 or 20 feet in front of me. It was a small doe. She scrambled to her feet and turned away from me and then she just LEAPT over the barb wire fence behind the creek. She seemed to hang in the air for a moment, her tail a white flag, her feet elegantly tucked up, her tiny hooves black and shiny. Her eyes were dark, and big, and full of fear. Her ears, one angled toward me to listen, to see if I would follow. Her fur, smooth and brown and beautiful. She leapt over the fence, out of the shade and into the sun.

And then she was gone.

Clint tried to track her for a while, but she was nowhere to be found. “I knew that’s where she was! I had a feeling!” I said.

“you and your feelings!” he smiled at me. He shook his head. “Well….I was RIGHT.” I smiled back. “you were.” he said.

We headed back to the truck, the long walk across the pasture in our orange vests and hats. I was hot and sweaty and so was he. This time when I took his hand, he didn’t scold me and we walked hand in hand toward the truck.

People drove by on the highway near the pasture and I thought how strange we must look, these hunters holding hands, dressed in orange vests and hats.

We drove home and I thought about that doe, leaping like that. Even though she was hurt. She summoned enough strength and ignored her pain enough to save her life, to keep from being put down.  

I told Clint she didn’t look like she was hurt that bad. He said she’d probably be alright if she could jump like that.

I thought about being a Godly woman. How my life, the girly girl part and the tomboy part, blurs and crosses back and forth. One minute I’m making soup. The next minute, I’m hoisting a dead buck by the antlers. One minute, I’m dressed for church. The next minute, I’m running barefoot thru a flood, fully made up for church, having kicked my shoes off so not to ruin them, in the chicken houses trying to find where the water is coming from. One minute, I’m driving my pastor’s wife (Susie, who made brownies and has them carefully covered in Saran Wrap on a plate and holds them in her lap)  to a bible study. The next minute, I’m pulling into the church parking lot and leaping from the car, screaming STOP IT, STOP HITTING THAT GIRL, NOT IN MY CHURCH PARKING LOT OR YOU’LL HAVE TO FIGHT ME TOO SO HELP ME GOD  at  a young man who is shoving his girlfriend around, chest bumping her, raising his forearm to knock her in the side of the head.   (Susie never even drops the brownies, so stunned is she.)

God made us both, He made male and female. We are both made in His image. Clint is tough and manly, but he is tender and sweet with babies and small children and me. I am soft and curvy, but do a man’s job in the chicken houses. Clint zigs where I zag and I rise when he falls and he lifts when I feel put down.

 I thought about that doe, elegant  and tiny footed, her lean, beautiful face as she leapt into the sunlight, regardless of her pain. 

I want to be like that.

Tender, but tough.

Delicate, but durable.

Injured, yet inspiring.

“As the deer panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, oh God.” Psalm 42:1

Oh dear (deer?) reader. Injured you may be, seek the cool of the shade by the brook. His living water is there, to quench your panting soul.

And never, ever let the world put you down.

Deer Reader :)

We’ve started a new bible study at my church, just us ladies. It’s about being a Godly woman and doing Godly, womanly things. It’s a good study and I’m enjoying it.

My life is different than most women I know. I have other female friends that have chicken houses, but their husbands stay home with them and they work together for the most part. In our world, I stay home and Clint goes to work and unless I’ve got a problem I rarely want him out there. He has so much to do and is so busy, I feel it a burden to ask him to do much in the chicken houses.  That being said, sometimes there are things I CANNOT do physically or are out of my comfort zone to fix. I can’t fix vent door cables. I know HOW to fix them, but physically I’m not strong enough. I’m good at trouble shooting and often can call Clint and tell him exactly what’s wrong and even what parts he may need to pick up.

 Sometimes my days blur between being a girly girl and being a tomboy. Saturday morning, I got up and worked out. Clint was gone hunting and I don’t have chickens right now. So, I made a big pot of homemade cream of tomato soup, homemade potato soup, and homemade pimento cheese. I cooked and I cooked. Then I cleaned and I cleaned. I painted old furniture and then distressed it to look old and beat up. I love things that look old and beat up. I like to tell Clint that’s why I love him and he just laughs. 

  Clint came home with a buck he had shot and I took my camera out there and snapped a few proud pictures. Aaron was there, a young man who came home with Trevor one day after school several years ago and just seemed to never completely leave. Clint and I feel like he is a stepson at this point. He comes for Sunday dinner pretty regularly and calls Clint to ask for advice or chat. Clint went into the shop and Aaron grabbed all four legs of the buck and heaved it out of the bed of the pickup. Aaron is a big, strong guy but the buck’s head just wouldn’t clear the tail gate so, I grabbed the antlers and helped Aaron carry it into the shop. I watched as Clint cut behind the tendons just above the back hooves and ran a hook thru them. They hoisted the buck into the air with the chain lift. Clint placed a piece of wood about a foot and a half across with wedges cut out of it between the buck’s back legs to hold them apart. It had already been gutted. He grabbed the hose and began washing the blood and grass and hair that had stuck to the inner part of the deer. The water and blood ran into the drain in the floor of the shop.  The dogs sniffed and snuffed the air. I watched as he cut around the white tail of the deer and  started to skin it. I’ve helped to skin many deer, but Aaron was there so I left it to him. “When y’all are done, I’ve got soup and pimento cheese and pound cake.”

Clint smiled at me, his camo splatted here and there with blood. “you’re a good woman. She’s a good woman, huh, Aaron? She’s a good cook, too.” Aaron smiled and agreed and said “I know.” I grinned at them and said “y’all just holler when you’re ready to eat.” and I headed inside the house.

I washed the blood off my hands and set about to painting again and cleaning. After finishing up with the deer,  Clint came in and ate and said he was going to take a nap. We’d both been fighting allergies/colds all week. I rarely nap. I actually dislike naps and always have. But I found the nap idea intriguing for some reason, so I lay down on the bed beside him  and fell asleep almost immediately.

I woke an hour later, confused and stupid. This is why I hate naps. I wake up confused and stupid every time and it doesn’t wear off for an hour.

I got up quietly and slipped out, Clint’s snore a steady sound. I puttered around the house til he got up.

We sat quietly and visited until his phone vibrated. He answered it and had a short conversation.

He stood up and said “well, that was Greg, he and his wife saw a deer limping across the pasture. Said it was limping pretty bad. It may have been shot or hit by a car. Either way, it’s limping and hurt.  Wanna  go with me and see if it needs put down?”

I got up and changed shoes. Clint dressed me in an orange vest and frowned at my pale pink ball cap and pulled it off and put on a hunter’s orange one. “I don’t look good in orange” I jokingly protested. “I’m a winter.” He sighed like he always does and we climbed into the truck.

We headed down the road, just across from our old house. The house we lived in when we first married and brought the babies home to. I always look at it if I drive by. It’s so full of memories of early years. I half expect to see Trevor or Tara, ages 6 and 4, playing on the carport. They are never there except in my mind.

We parked and got out and headed into the pasture. Clint got his rifle out in case he had to put the deer down. Many round bales of hay dotted here and there. We whispered to each other quietly about where this deer might be. I said “if I were a deer, and I was hurt, I’d get in the shade, and hide under a tree.” Clint said “yup.” I said “don’t deer head for water when they’re hurt?” “yup.” said Clint. “ooh, I bet it’s down there, there’s a creek and it’d be cool and a good hiding place!” I said excitedly.  Clint said “yup.” then he added “ Shhhhh. Don’t talk. Walk quieter.”

We walked along side by side and I said “this is a nice evening for a walk!” Clint agreed. I reached to take his hand, as if we were on a lover’s lane or walking in a store. He said “sweetie, I gotta have my hands free in case I have to shoot.”

I sighed. I forgot we weren’t just walking and  I have trouble being quiet. I tried. I saw in the distance the trees, the inside of the woods dark and cool, inviting. I started walked toward it, sure that’s where a hurt deer would go.

“would you slow DOWN??” Clint said. “you walk too fast. You have to slip around.” I sighed again. I cannot slip around. But I tried.

Finally we got to where we thought the deer might be and I slowed, looking carefully into the brush. Clint walked on ahead about 30 feet and did the same, slowly peering and peeking. I took a step into the beginning of the brush, feeling sure the deer was near me. Clint got my attention and said in a whisper “if it’s wounded, it might try to hurt you if you get too close. Be careful!” I nodded and took another step. I could see the creek. I could see the slope of the bank, the large dead trees lying here and there, pushed by  past flood waters. It was beautiful. If I were an injured deer, this is where I’d rest, in the shade, near the cool water.  

I heard the deer before I saw it, just 15 or 20 feet in front of me. It was a small doe. She scrambled to her feet and turned away from me and then she just LEAPT over the barb wire fence behind the creek. She seemed to hang in the air for a moment, her tail a white flag, her feet elegantly tucked up, her tiny hooves black and shiny. Her eyes were dark, and big, and full of fear. Her ears, one angled toward me to listen, to see if I would follow. Her fur, smooth and brown and beautiful. She leapt over the fence, out of the shade and into the sun.

And then she was gone.

Clint tried to track her for a while, but she was nowhere to be found. “I knew that’s where she was! I had a feeling!” I said.

“you and your feelings!” he smiled at me. He shook his head. “Well….I was RIGHT.” I smiled back. “you were.” he said.

We headed back to the truck, the long walk across the pasture in our orange vests and hats. I was hot and sweaty and so was he. This time when I took his hand, he didn’t scold me and we walked hand in hand toward the truck.

People drove by on the highway near the pasture and I thought how strange we must look, these hunters holding hands, dressed in orange vests and hats.

We drove home and I thought about that doe, leaping like that. Even though she was hurt. She summoned enough strength and ignored her pain enough to save her life, to keep from being put down.  

I told Clint she didn’t look like she was hurt that bad. He said she’d probably be alright if she could jump like that.

I thought about being a Godly woman. How my life, the girly girl part and the tomboy part, blurs and crosses back and forth. One minute I’m making soup. The next minute, I’m hoisting a dead buck by the antlers. One minute, I’m dressed for church. The next minute, I’m running barefoot thru a flood, fully made up for church, having kicked my shoes off so not to ruin them, in the chicken houses trying to find where the water is coming from. One minute, I’m driving my pastor’s wife (Susie, who made brownies and has them carefully covered in Saran Wrap on a plate and holds them in her lap)  to a bible study. The next minute, I’m pulling into the church parking lot and leaping from the car, screaming STOP IT, STOP HITTING THAT GIRL, NOT IN MY CHURCH PARKING LOT OR YOU’LL HAVE TO FIGHT ME TOO SO HELP ME GOD  at  a young man who is shoving his girlfriend around, chest bumping her, raising his forearm to knock her in the side of the head.   (Susie never even drops the brownies, so stunned is she.)

God made us both, He made male and female. We are both made in His image. Clint is tough and manly, but he is tender and sweet with babies and small children and me. I am soft and curvy, but do a man’s job in the chicken houses. Clint zigs where I zag and I rise when he falls and he lifts when I feel put down.

 I thought about that doe, elegant  and tiny footed, her lean, beautiful face as she leapt into the sunlight, regardless of her pain. 

I want to be like that.

Tender, but tough.

Delicate, but durable.

Injured, yet inspiring.

“As the deer panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, oh God.” Psalm 42:1

Oh dear (deer?) reader. Injured you may be, seek the cool of the shade by the brook. His living water is there, to quench your panting soul.

And never, ever let the world put you down.

Deer Reader

We’ve started a new bible study at my church, just us ladies. It’s about being a Godly woman and doing Godly, womanly things. It’s a good study and I’m enjoying it.

My life is different than most women I know. I have other female friends that have chicken houses, but their husbands stay home with them and they work together for the most part. In our world, I stay home and Clint goes to work and unless I’ve got a problem I rarely want him out there. He has so much to do and is so busy, I feel it a burden to ask him to do much in the chicken houses.  That being said, sometimes there are things I CANNOT do physically or are out of my comfort zone to fix. I can’t fix vent door cables. I know HOW to fix them, but physically I’m not strong enough. I’m good at trouble shooting and often can call Clint and tell him exactly what’s wrong and even what parts he may need to pick up.

 Sometimes my days blur between being a girly girl and being a tomboy. Saturday morning, I got up and worked out. Clint was gone hunting and I don’t have chickens right now. So, I made a big pot of homemade cream of tomato soup, homemade potato soup, and homemade pimento cheese. I cooked and I cooked. Then I cleaned and I cleaned. I painted old furniture and then distressed it to look old and beat up. I love things that look old and beat up. I like to tell Clint that’s why I love him and he just laughs. 

  Clint came home with a buck he had shot and I took my camera out there and snapped a few proud pictures. Aaron was there, a young man who came home with Trevor one day after school several years ago and just seemed to never completely leave. Clint and I feel like he is a stepson at this point. He comes for Sunday dinner pretty regularly and calls Clint to ask for advice or chat. Clint went into the shop and Aaron grabbed all four legs of the buck and heaved it out of the bed of the pickup. Aaron is a big, strong guy but the buck’s head just wouldn’t clear the tail gate so, I grabbed the antlers and helped Aaron carry it into the shop. I watched as Clint cut behind the tendons just above the back hooves and ran a hook thru them. They hoisted the buck into the air with the chain lift. Clint placed a piece of wood about a foot and a half across with wedges cut out of it between the buck’s back legs to hold them apart. It had already been gutted. He grabbed the hose and began washing the blood and grass and hair that had stuck to the inner part of the deer. The water and blood ran into the drain in the floor of the shop.  The dogs sniffed and snuffed the air. I watched as he cut around the white tail of the deer and  started to skin it. I’ve helped to skin many deer, but Aaron was there, so I left it to him. “When y’all are done, I’ve got soup and pimento cheese and pound cake.”

Clint smiled at me, his camo splatted here and there with blood. “you’re a good woman. She’s a good woman, huh, Aaron? She’s a good cook, too.” Aaron smiled and agreed and said “I know.” I grinned at them and said “y’all just holler when you’re ready to eat.” and I headed inside the house.

I washed the blood off my hands and set about to painting again and cleaning. After finishing up with the deer,  Clint came in and ate and said he was going to take a nap. We’d both been fighting allergies/colds all week. I rarely nap. I actually dislike naps and always have. But I found the nap idea intriguing for some reason, so I lay down on the bed beside him  and fell asleep almost immediately.

I woke an hour later, confused and stupid. This is why I hate naps. I wake up confused and stupid every time and it doesn’t wear off for an hour.

I got up quietly and slipped out, Clint’s snore a steady sound. I puttered around the house til he got up. He got up an hour after me and stood in the door with his just-woke-from-a-nap face and said “hey, babe.” He headed to his recliner.

We sat quietly and visited until his phone vibrated. He answered it and had a short conversation.

He stood up and said “well, that was Greg, he and his wife saw a deer limping across the pasture. Said it was limping pretty bad. It may have been shot or hit by a car. Either way, it’s limping and hurt.  Wanna  go with me and see if it needs put down?”

I got up and changed shoes. Clint dressed me in an orange vest and frowned at my pale pink ball cap and pulled it off and put on a hunter’s orange one. “I don’t look good in orange” I jokingly protested. “I’m a winter.” He sighed like he always does and we climbed into the truck.

We headed down the road, just across from our old house. The house we lived in when we first married and brought the babies home to. I always look at it if I drive by. It’s so full of memories of early years. I half expect to see Trevor or Tara, ages 6 and 4, playing on the carport. They are never there except in my mind.

We parked and got out and headed into the pasture. Clint got his rifle out in case he had to put the deer down. Many round bales of hay dotted here and there. We whispered to each other quietly about where this deer might be. I said “if I were a deer, and I was hurt, I’d get in the shade, and hide under a tree.” Clint said “yup.”

 I said “don’t deer head for water when they’re hurt?” “yup.” said Clint.

 “ooh, I bet it’s down there, there’s a creek and it’d be cool and a good hiding place!” I said excitedly.  

Clint said “yup.” then he added “ Shhhhh. Don’t talk. Walk quieter.”

We walked along side by side and I said “this is a nice evening for a walk!” Clint agreed. I reached to take his hand, as if we were on a lover’s lane or walking in a store. He said “sweetie, I gotta have my hands free in case I have to shoot.”

I sighed. I forgot we weren’t just walking and  I have trouble being quiet. I tried. I saw in the distance the trees, the inside of the woods dark and cool, inviting. I started walked toward it, sure that’s where a hurt deer would go.

“would you slow DOWN??” Clint said. “you walk too fast. You have to slip around.” I sighed again. I cannot slip around. But I tried.

Finally we got to where we thought the deer might be and I slowed, looking carefully into the brush. Clint walked on ahead about 30 feet and did the same, slowly peering and peeking. I took a step into the beginning of the brush, feeling sure the deer was near me. Clint got my attention and said in a whisper “if it’s wounded, it might try to hurt you if you get too close. Be careful!” I nodded and took another step. I could see the creek. I could see the slope of the bank, the large dead trees lying here and there, pushed by  past flood waters. It was beautiful. If I were an injured deer, this is where I’d rest, in the shade, near the cool water.  

I heard the deer before I saw it, just 15 or 20 feet in front of me. It was a small doe. She scrambled to her feet and turned away from me and then she just LEAPT over the barb wire fence behind the creek. She seemed to hang in the air for a moment, her tail a white flag, her feet elegantly tucked up, her tiny hooves black and shiny. Her eyes were dark, and big, and full of fear. Her ears, one angled toward me to listen, to see if I would follow. Her fur, smooth and brown and beautiful. She leapt over the fence, out of the shade and into the sun.

And then she was gone.

Clint tried to track her for a while, but she was nowhere to be found. “I knew that’s where she was! I had a feeling!” I said.

“you and your feelings!” he smiled at me. He shook his head. “Well….I was RIGHT.” I smiled back. “you were.” he said.

We headed back to the truck, the long walk across the pasture in our orange vests and hats. I was hot and sweaty and so was he. This time when I took his hand, he didn’t scold me and we walked hand in hand toward the truck.

People drove by on the highway near the pasture and I thought how strange we must look, these hunters holding hands, dressed in orange vests and hats.

We drove home and I thought about that doe, leaping like that. Even though she was hurt. She summoned enough strength and ignored her pain enough to save her life, to keep from being put down.  

I told Clint she didn’t look like she was hurt that bad. He said she’d probably be alright if she could jump like that.

I thought about being a Godly woman. How my life, the girly girl part and the tomboy part, blurs and crosses back and forth. One minute I’m making soup. The next minute, I’m hoisting a dead buck by the antlers. One minute, I’m dressed for church. The next minute, I’m running barefoot thru a flood, fully made up for church, having kicked my shoes off so not to ruin them, in the chicken houses trying to find where the water is coming from. One minute, I’m driving my pastor’s wife (Susie, who made brownies and has them carefully covered in Saran Wrap on a plate and holds them in her lap)  to a bible study. The next minute, I’m pulling into the church parking lot and leaping from the car, screaming STOP IT, STOP HITTING THAT GIRL, NOT IN MY CHURCH PARKING LOT OR YOU’LL HAVE TO FIGHT ME TOO SO HELP ME GOD  at  a young man who is shoving his girlfriend around, chest bumping her, raising his forearm to knock her in the side of the head.   (Susie never even drops the brownies, so stunned is she.)

God made us both, He made male and female. We are both made in His image. Clint is tough and manly, but he is tender and sweet with babies and small children and me. I am soft and round and  curvy, but do a man’s job in the chicken houses. Clint zigs where I zag and I rise when he falls and he lifts when I feel put down.

 I thought about that doe, elegant  and tiny footed, her lean, beautiful face as she leapt into the sunlight, regardless of her pain. 

I want to be like that.

Tender, but tough.

Delicate, but durable.

Injured, yet inspiring.

“As the deer panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, oh God.” Psalm 42:1

Oh dear (deer?) reader. Injured you may be, seek the cool of the shade by the brook. His living water is there, to quench your panting soul.

And never, ever let the world put you down

Slamming Doors

  I sighed as I looked at who the text was from. I have been in the process of untangling myself from her for a while now. Sometimes, dear reader…you can help and listen and do and care and work and counsel and it is all for NAUGHT. Might as well teach a pig to sing, I remind myself, thus wasting  your time and annoying the pig.

  I don’t respond to the texts, they are hurtful and useless, like stripping the bloom off the rose, leaving only the thorns. This bloom was stripped off long ago and I tire of trying to pick up the thorns without being poked and stabbed. There was no way to not get hurt. 

  It seemed as though God finally looked at me and said “would you just STOP and let Me handle her??” I finally listened and I handed her to God. I pray for her and her family that I am no longer a part of. But…I do not miss her. How can you miss what was never really yours to start with? I never felt a part of her. Never. I tried, early on…but dropped it self consciously a while back. So, it was what it was and it is what it is and what it is is GONE.

  I like 2% cheese. Bear with me. It tastes the same, melts the same, looks the same…but has less fat and MORE calcium. See? This is my clumsy way of telling you that removing unhealthy, life clogging things can leave room for healthy, bone building things. Things that strengthen femurs and tibias and yes, spines.

  Sometimes you may have to shut the door on something in your past. Just SLAM it shut, like doors are slammed in anger and rage. I’ve heard a lot of slamming doors and the sound is final and sure, full of sad endings, scary beginnings, happy relief.  

  So, shut the doors on rooms in your life filled with junk and trash  and garbage that you don’t want or need to hang onto. Hurt? Anger? Rage? Pain? Slam. Slam. Slam. SLAM! Hand God the key to that room and lock it up and SLAM IT SHUT.

  What’s funny is….sometimes when you do that…slam it shut…there are people in there. Family.  Former friends. Relationships. Tangled, tense torsion. You’ve been wrapped up in their godlessness and strife so long, you expect pain. You even welcome it. You feel you deserve it. You think you can fix it.  Because you are the fixer, the runner, the one who overlooks it all and drops everything and gallops to the rescue.

 Would you just STOP and give them over to God? Let Him handle it? Get out of the way, lest that door slam shut, trapping you inside that room? Put the thorns DOWN for heaven’s sake and for ONCE enjoy the scent of the roses without getting hurt. God gave you a spine. A strong, steely spine.  Fortified with good things. A spine.  USE IT.

 I closed my eyes and said a prayer for her, this unwanted texter, this thorn. I clicked the “view” button for the text. I smiled.

  It was, dear reader…a picture of a door.

 Of all things to send me…a door.  Coincidence, you say? Oh, I do not believe in coincidences. God has led me to this point, to this threshold…to this door. It is up to me what to do with it.

Thus being shown the door, I mentally slammed it shut. What a glorious, final sound.

Slam some doors in your life. It’s about dadburn time you did. Ask God which ones and hand Him the key and slam with all your might.  Never go back to that door. Never knock on it. Never try the doorknob. And…if you are tempted to go back..tell God about it.

“Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him and will sup with him, and he with me.” Revelation 3:20 KJV

Tell God about it and He’ll go knock on that door.

That’s the key. So…lock that door and give it and THEM  to God.

No Stranger to the Rain

I heard the rain on the roof of the chicken houses. Loud and steady. It’s an unmistakable sound, this clatter of rain drops on a tin roof , 500 feet long and 40 feet wide. Funny thing, the dimensions of Noah’s ark, the length, the width, are very similar to my chicken houses. I think about this as the rain falls and I look at the chickens and think perhaps I have spent 40 days and nights in there just today it seems. I’m getting ready to “go out” which means they come get the chickens and I get a few days off. I never forget I don’t have chickens, I like to say and often will catch myself headed out there to check them only to realize they are gone. Getting ready to “go out” is a tedious process of rolling a few things up out of the way and hiding handles to the vent doors and tunnel curtains because for some reason, the catch crew (the men who come get the chickens, usually Hispanic, usually don’t speak English) will turn the cranks and then, when I come out there to get ready for baby chicks everything is out of whack and I turn on machines and  it breaks cables and pulls things literally off the wall. Sigh. So, I’ve learned to check things and put things right but mostly, to pull those durn handles OFF beforehand  so as not to temp the little darlings to spin them.

  I heard the rain and my heart sank just a little. Crud, I thought. I had driven the Kubota out there. It’s the best thing for me to dump the dead chickens but…it has no roof. It has no windshield. I looked out the door, the rain pulled in on my face by the fans. It was cold. Maggie My Dog and Tika came running inside, scattering the big chickens. Tika waited patiently by the door while Maggie trotted behind me. I threw the chickens into the back of the bed of the Kubota. My wrists were hurting. I had done a fair amount of culling. To make it quick and painless for the chickens, I have to be brutal and quick with my hands. This causes me great pain. Not internally, mind you. It truly does not faze me at all to kill a chicken. It causes me no more grief than plucking a tomato from the vine. I don’t want these runty, sickly, fuzzed up culls in the food chain. So, kill them I must.  You can thank me later.

But it causes my hands to shake and my wrists to be achy for days sometimes. I’ll turn a doorknob and feel a twinge. Arthritis, I’ll think. And that, dear reader, is what it is. Regardless of the age I FEEL I am (oh, around 30) I am FORTY TWO. Every bit of it and my body reminds me every day. It reminds me as I type, as I sew, as I chop vegetables or mix a cake batter by hand.

  I counted the chickens and wrote them down and tallied them in the computer that runs the chicken house.

 I stuck my phone in my bra, dear reader, to keep it dry and safe and not be dropped in disgusting puddles of goo. I strode into the rain and sat on the seat, my lower half instantly drenched. I drove to each house and gathered up the dead from each one, counting as I picked up and threw. The feathers in the houses stuck to my wet arms, my face. I spit them from my lips.

  I drove to the composter and dumped the dead, the rain falling on me, coming in sideways.

           ( a memory)

 Rain hit my shirt, hit my neck, hit my eyes.

(so long ago. the sounds of violence. glass breaking)

I drove on, feeling this memory break thru the surface of glass that my brain can be.

(screams. thud. get help. get help. cold rain)

I feel the glass of my brain crack and give and snap.

(me,  clad in a t-shirt and underwear, dressed for bed but now… barefoot, running in the night)

I feel my heart beat quicken. What is this memory? Flotsam, jetsam, bits of leaves and sticks floating in a stream of dark water.

(my t shirt soaked, my feet fly over rocks and puddles, the highway glistens in the night, headlights blind  me and pass without stopping, this ten year old running, in the cold rain, along the highway)

I stop the Kubota and sit. I lean my forehead on to the steering wheel. Rain drips from my hat. Maggie My Dog whimpers from the seat, looks at me. Go home, her whine says. Go home.

 (I am standing on a porch. the neighbor lady  drags me inside, throws a towel over me, tells me I’m indecent, cover up. get help, I stutter)

I start the Kubota. Maggie My Dog looks pleased. I drive home, feeling the rain on my face. It feels good, crisp, pure.

(I try to leave the neighbor’s house, she tries to stop me. she has called the police. I run, she scrabbles at me, grabbing the towel. I run, indecent again, down the highway back to the house.)

I kick my boots off in the breezeway. I let Maggie My Dog inside, she runs to her soft bed and sighs contentedly.

I pull my wet clothes off and step into the shower. Water hits me again, but warm. I turn it as hot as I can stand, my skin turning bright red.

(I’m in the house, pulling wet t shirt and undies off and putting on dry ones. the violence is winding down, blue lights flash and flash again, low voices, assurances and explanations)

I dry myself  from my hot shower and put on dry clothes and sit on my bed.

(I slide into bed, pretend to sleep, but there is none that night, only bits and pieces and dreams of running down black highways alone in the cold)

I call Clint.

“ I’m done with chickens! They were fine. Got brooders and sensors up.”

“well, sounds like you earned your keep today.” he says. I hear the smile in his voice.

“it’s raining, hard. And it’s cold. I got soaked!” I tell him.

“oh, you’ll live.” he laughs. “ a little water never hurt you. You won’t melt.”

I laugh back.

“that’s true!” I say.

“you’ve been wet before.” he continues. “you’ll get dry.”

    (rain slicked highway, headlights blinding, soaked t shirts, dirty, wet feet)

“oh, yes,” I say. “I’ve gotten soaked several times. Hasn’t killed me yet.”

          (rain in my eyes mixed with my tears I’m indecent)

We chat for a minute or two, then I hang up and sit on the couch. The house is quiet, save for the rain. Sweet, blessed, cold rain.

Washes the glass of my brain clean, I think.

 I sit on my couch. I curl my feet up underneath me.

 I pray for a moment, a silent, wordless prayer of jumbled thoughts of Clint and my children and their spouses, my friends who are my surrogate mother and sisters and brothers. Thank You, God, for washing me in Your rain. Flotsam and jetsam float away in His rivulets of rain.

Oh, dear reader. I am no stranger to cold rain and dirty, running feet.  Of breaking glass, and glistening wet highways.

Neither are you.

And that is our bond.