By Carie Moore
Spring is here and many of us have our go-to lists we need to get us through the season.
Here is my top 10, in no particular order. Okay. Check that. #1 is truly #1.
- Coffee. Must NOT be decaf and must be in a special travel tumbler based on the day and my activities. The Amazing Grace tumbler is for when I’m working with my husband. The May My Coffee Be Stronger Than My Children one is pretty much self-explanatory. The #thinkPIGND one when I’m with those who disagree with my decisions about certain farming practices or just don’t like pigs. The Cowgirl Up one is for those times when I know I have to do something difficult. I have like 10 others but you get the point. My husband wonders why I have so many. Dude, some women have shoes, I have coffee mugs!
- The zip-lock package containing my yellow/black rubber handled side cutter pliers, Carmex with three small hair rubber bands wrapped around it, gum, toilet paper, blue-inked pen, zip-ties, and other female “necessities.” This way it can be easily moved from coat pocket, cooler, purse, or whatever I carry that day. My special pliers and zip ties can pretty much fix anything. Did you know zip ties make a better hairband than duct tape?
- Phone with music and other apps like TED talks, church sermons, and YouTube. In many of our fields, you only get radio reception on some stations when the tractor is going one direction only. Seriously, you can’t make this stuff up. This is also important for communication. Picture the first day of harvest. While unloading, I shove my phone in my back pocket as I crawl up the metal bin to guide the auger, only to realize, as I sit on top of the bin that I neglected to put the screen toward my body and totally cracked my phone screen and can’t use it So, when I’m in the combine 30 minutes later and there is smoke coming out the back from a belt starting to burn and I can’t see or smell it yet and the hubby is driving along side of me hanging out the window with arms flailing, it’s good to have a phone. Any day of field season is a good time to have a phone, but the first day of harvest is especially important!
- Box of blue shop towels with the cutout handle. When the coffee mug spills going over a protruding rock, when the kids have a bathroom emergency, when hooking up that hydraulic hose that has the coupler covered in spewed old fluid that has that layer of dirt, bird poop, cattail poofs, and Lord only knows what else covering it. They also work as a seat for a buddy and the hole in top is a great coffee cup holder!!!
- Grace and patience. When you know more about the smoking combine (see #3) than your husband, because you read the manual when the RECIRC light came on and it clearly says “DO NOT SHUT OFF COMBINE WHILE RECIRC IS IN PROGRESS.” This is all happening while you wait for your husband to come back “in five minutes” and it is actually 45 minutes, but he yells at you for wasting fuel and not shutting off the combine.
- Family/Friends. These sweet, dear, wonderful children of mine who have been in this glass box with me for hours eating, sleeping, fighting, crying, singing, begging are driving me crazy so can you please come get them? Pretty please? I’ll buy you Dairy Queen, a new car, a hut in Tahiti, you name it as long as you TAKE THEM NOW!
- Food. I can’t go anywhere without food. Hangry is not cool when I’m out of grace and patience.
- Great parts guys. The ones who see me five times in one day and finally say, “Just go in the back and get the one you really need.” They are the ones I bring doughnuts and coffee to because parts runs mean doughnut store and expensive coffee stops. Whoot! Whoot! If they deliver your parts you end up paying a service call fee. Doughnuts and coffee are a small price to pay!
- Social Media. I love to show what I’m doing and why to those who don’t farm. I love to encourage women because we all struggle and have joys no matter who we are. As women, we are always trying to do more. It’s better to try and fail than to sit and wonder if you can or not. We all have different skills. I can also see women doing things I don’t or can’t on the farm and learn from them.
- Timely rain days to stop the high emotions, catch up on dishes, laundry, groceries, and repairs that were temporary field fixes.
I love farming and it’s deep in my blood. There are so many more things that are important to do and have but these are what’s unique to me and make for a successful day despite what happens around here.