It’s the Small Things

Owning a small farm or homestead seems idyllic and most days it certainly lives up to the dream.

Coming home at the end of a stressful work day and seeing the cattle grazing contently at the end of the drive without a care in the world. A perfect picture of that idyllic country life for which you drag yourself out of bed each morning to go to work to sustain.

But as you round the bend and start heading up the drive – reality hits. You notice the small things that need to be tended. The grass under the electric fence that needs trimmed. The branches on trees that need to be pruned. Peaches that need to be picked. Garden that needs to be tilled and all the other myriad of items on that ever growing never ending check list.

As you enter the door and head upstairs to change out of your stiff city clothes to your comfy worn country clothes, you suddenly remember a small but important thing left over from the weekend.

It’s not a big thing, and you’re tempted to put it off till the weekend. The fence is still hot, okay maybe not hot, but current is registering on the tester, and besides the cattle don’t know it’s not hot and have learned not to test it.

But your better judgement prevails and the thought of a midnight call from a neighbor with one of your cows in their front yard causes you to spend the next hour walking the line.

If you’ve ever had an electric fence you soon learn that the short will always be at the opposite end from where you started.

But soon you see the problem – a small thing. You replace the small thing – which takes all of two minutes, and mentally mark it off that perpetual list.

Then you notice that grass growing under the bottom wire…

Yes living in the country is idyllic, and I wouldn’t trade the peace and privacy of country living for any home in any subdivision or city and I’ve learned to accept the small things (and sometimes larger scale things).

Cumulatively they are worth the price of contentment and the joy that comes from settling in on the front porch for a few minutes and watching those contented cows before crawling in bed.

It’s the small things…