SIMPLE TIMES BY SU Z Y Mc C RAY
THE CO-OP PANTRY Simply Growing Older on Your Farm or Homestead My mama used to tell me that I just couldn’t understand. Even though she was in her mid-80s, in her mind she still thought and felt just like she did when she was in her twenties. While her body might often fail her, she still went about as many activities as she could on our little farm. Wearing her old-fashioned-looking bonnet and long cotton sleeved shirt even on the hottest days, she dragged seemingly miles of electrical cord behind her as she weedeated all around her property, having given in to the electrical model when her strength would no longer allow her to crank the gasoline-powered weed whacker. When we bought the original farmhouse from her when my daddy died, there were at least seven coats of paint on the kitchen cabinets because when she wanted to remodel, she wielded that paint brush wherever needed. After Daddy died and then her second husband was in the nursing home, she still nailed up curtain rods, planted flowers, and did all her maintenance and cleaning. So, there was no question where I got my independent spirit before and after I was widowed at age 60. I attempted anything that needed doing on this little homestead. I built animal sheds, used a borrowed electric chain saw to prepare at least half of my firewood
for my wood burning heater, stretched fencing, tended multiple critters and enjoyed every minute of it! Now I am BLESSED to have my multitalented husband Mack with me on this little homestead and everyone comments on how this farm doesn’t look anything like it did! But we will both turn 68 this year and realistically we realize there MAY come a time when we have to slow down, even if it’s just a little! As most of you regular readers of this column know, I tried to live as simple a life as possible. I love the older simpler ways. I heated only with wood, had no air conditioning, and no clothes dryer, for close to 40 years…I loved sewing on my old treadle sewing machine…. Now I sit here looking out my back window on things that are making our lives easier while still living simply, even though I’m enjoying the heat from a nearby propane heater and now have the OPTION of drying our clothes in a dryer IF the weather continues raining like it has all week. I’m looking out at a new red metal 40 x 40 feet barn that has replaced my multitude of small animal sheds. Now all animals are in one place so feeding can be done fairly comfortably and easily, with goats on one side in their special lean-to area of the barn, chickens on the opposite side with a 20 x 20 heavy-screened tincovered area in addition to their ability to be turned into April 2020
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