Thankful for things unknown

As I grow older I'm learning more and more with every passing day. I grew up on a dairy farm in Northeast Iowa. Growing up on a farm was an amazing experience and as I look back I wouldn't want to grow up any other way.

I can remember being about 3 or 4 years old and we had a milk cart that held the milkers, sanitizer spray bottles, water bucket and other tid-bits used during the milking process. I would sit inside the cart and hand my older brother and sister the rags to wash the cows teats clean. As I got older I would have to go out for chores and feed the baby calves their bottle of milk and their ration of grain. I also had to help feed the cows their grain and hay. My younger brother and I usually had this chore, while my older siblings had to help dad milk cows or take care of the heifers in the cowyard or the steers behind the barn. My younger brother and I also had the job of cleaning barn...yes unfortunately the barn doesn't clean itself. After the cows get down doing their natural duty...hint hint...we had to come in a scrape it all in the gutters so it could get pumped to the lagoon (first rule of thumb set by mother: NEVER go play around the lagoon without adult supervision) after scraping we had to spread bits of limstone which we called "lime" or "lyme" whichever I suppose (never looked at the spelling on the bag! after all those years!) and we had to chop straw for the cows bedding. After cleaning barn we threw hay and gave the cows their grain. Next came the sad part...letting all the cows back in the barn just so they could mess it up again. This process is a daily routine.

As a kid I can remember enjoying being outside with my younger brother doing chores and being with daddy. We would always goof off and try to make our chores into a game, sometimes stalling and making dad mad for being slow at getting our job done and keeping him out in the barn longer than needed. As the years progressed...my slowness got worse, just ask my mother. As a teenager in junior high and high school...chores weren't something that I looked forward to doing after I got home from school, however with older brother and sister gone at college someone had to help dad out in the barn. Not wanting to go out and help I was slow and usually got my butt chewed out for being slow by either one of my parents. Once I got out to the barn things got better and turned out not to be that bad.

As a college student I obviously don't have to do farm chores anymore, but I'm in charge of several personal responsiblities that no one is going to do for me except myself. Thanks to past experience growing up on a farm I've learned that being slow and slackish isn't the attitude to have towards college. Professors don't remind you that you have a missing assignment out and they aren't going to feel sorry for you when you come whining to them saying you missed the last two weeks of class because "you didn't feel like it". Reality is this is the point in your life when you start becoming who you really are and portraying your attitude towards the world around you and how you're going to deal with issues in everyday life. I'll admit, sometimes I can't handle it and I get stressed out to the point I just need to let it out and sometimes cry. Crying does wonders for me when I'm stressed out. Crying and sleeping does wonders..maybe this sounds babyish and immature but sometimes that's what it takes for me to get through tough situations. Mind you I do this in the privacy of my own room and NOT in public! That would be very immature!

I guess I just hope that people don't take things for granted. Growing up my parents always reminded me that someday I would thank them for making me do chores and having me wake up "early" or the fact that I wasn't able to go to all the fun things because other things had to be done at home first. I learned that way; at the time I hated it, but now I'm glad it went that way. I feel so blessed that I got to see my parents practially every single day of my life up until I moved to college. How many kids nowadays can say that? I want my parents to know that I am truly thankful that God put me where he did. I wouldn't want to grow up any other way. I wouldn't change a thing about my childhood, because of those days and memories I am who I am today because of that. Yes, mom if you read this, I enjoyed helping dad milk cows over winter break. We had good talks about random stuff and that was something that we didn't do a whole lot when I was in high school. And mom, I enjoy just talking with you about anything, and watching movies and sitting with the kitties. Miss Kitty was a gift from beyond the blue, without her in our lives who knows how things at home would be now.

So I guess I just want to say to everyone, recall your childhood. What was good? What was bad? Do you regret anything? What did you learn? Don't take it for granted because you're only young once.