This year, every time we cut the hay it rained. This time it rained then it snowed then it dried beautifully. My friend and I walked out to the hay makers field before lunch yesterday. She had come down to help me with the winterizing. Lunch would be pumpkin soup made with pears and lemon accompanied by a lively white wine. With pizza bianca and pastrami (more on that tomorrow) and lettuce from my little patch. I said, as we walked, the man is coming to bale the hay this afternoon. We stood in the field and leaned down to gather fragrant barely dried handfuls of green cow food goodness. Look at that, I said, as it broke perfectly but still holding its leaves. I threw it in the air and it floated gently to the ground.
I smiled and said the bad word. Perfect. As I spoke she looked at me and jumped slightly, startled, blinking her eye. I felt a rain drop, she said. No. I said. I spoke looking skyward. Light grey clouds, sitting like a lid but no rainclouds, no rain in the forecast.
And as I looked up and around, dragging her eyes up with me, it rained. No. I whispered. Not again. But yes. We gathered ourselves together, tucking our chins in, arms folded, heads slightly bent to keep the rain from our eyelashes and scuttled back to the house.
It was a good shower. It was still raining as we sat down to lunch and then drizzling as we took the bottle and a couple of glasses to the fire place. And tailing off as we called the dogs in. And though the rain came down and the day darkened and the last of the leaves fell outside and the dogs collapsed in heaps by the fire, I was happy to enjoy a blissful afternoon, a break with a friend, a rare few hours sitting by the fire, our legs curled beneath us in big orange chairs, our glasses almost but not quite forgotten and our conversation dancing like butterflies on ether with the power of flowers, from this to that and back to this other thing. Girl talk. Intelligent, well read, girl talk. The hay would be worried over later. The wringing of hands could wait.
The hay man came in the night and baled the wet hay into round bales. He will take them away and feed them immediately to his own cows. He has a big crew to feed. It would be mouldy before Daisy and Queenie has even begun. At least this way it will not be wasted.
He will give me some of his dry bales as a fair exchange. But I hated to see it go. It had been a perfect crop until that miserable bloody shower. Failed again. Foiled again. Foibles. Smoibles. Toy bells. Ah well. My friend and I had a lovely day regardless.
Today I am going to go to the barn to diligently scoop and clean. Then I will write 5,000 words. 5,000 legible words that is. Piper paying time.
Have a lovely day.
your friend on the farm,
celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
48 responses to “Rain on the hay – my language could be stronger…”
You wear it well….the disappointments and setbacks…I don’t think I could. Lovely description of forgetting it all with a friend by the fireside. Write some good words:)
Gorgeous photos. That usually happens to us but with traffic! No sooner are the words “it’s not so bad today” trailing in the air do we see the red brake lights all around us. Murphy’s law.
Sorry about the hay that is such bad luck. But what good luck that the hay man will take your wet hay and replace it with dry. Love the first picture, the light is wonderful.
This time of year every field is a different shade, I am endlessly trying to get a good shot of it. Sometimes i would like to be suspended by a crane above the landscape so that I could get the angle of an angel. c
If I was closer you could climb on top of our combine! LOL Or! You could climb to the top of our tallest grain bin!!! I’d wait on the ground if you don’t mind! 😉
Or, four loads of laundry on the line. Check the sky: clear, blue, innocent of clouds. Jump in the car to do something in town. Once there, the heavens open. The laundry is drenched, fallen off the line, dirty again by the time you get back. Rain has a way of drastically affecting our language, and not for the better, usually.
Foibles, smoilbels and toy bells..such language ….I could think of other words that I would have said…..there goes that saying again…never rains but it pours….
The light and vista in that first image are stunning. Spoken by a true prairie girl, you know.
As for the rain falling upon the alfalfa, weather is one thing you cannot control in farming, which, of course, you know. Not all is lost given that bale exchange.
All I can say is, I hope it’s better next year 😉
Isn’t time with girlfriends just wonderful?! So glad you both could enjoy the day, even with the rain coming down on the hay. And wonderful you can switch it for some dry bales. xoxoxo
Foibles, smoibles, as you so eloquently put it. What we need is a witch dioctor for the next time you cut hay.
I’m glad you had some pleasure from the afternoonl.
Love,
ViV
The rain is such a fickle ally. Good for you, putting it all aside to have a good afternoon. I hope those 5000 words did as they were told at least and marched right out on to the page .
I am so happy you and your friend were able to enjoy each other. What would a woman do without a friend or two to have smart conversation and reflections on the state of life? I don’t have many close friends but I cherish the ones I have 🙂
Lovely description of the time with your friend.
yes….yes….
i watch the local farmers’ fields. i watch the weather. i think [i PRAY] …. all those who count on the hay….
What lovely prose, Celi. My heart ached for you as I read this piece. The life of farm folks isn’t an easy life without troubles and disappointments. Mother nature goes about her business of rain, sleet, snow, wind, and temperature variances, and the farmer endures it all without question. Some years present much heartache and still, the farmer presses on, in hope that next year will be one to marvel at and give prosper. I love your passion, my friend. You are a beautiful soul…
So glad you had the lovely visit with your friend to sweeten the “bad hay day.”