You remember the tv commercial, don’t you. Sally Struthers, of All in the Family fame, doing the voice over
Do you want to make more money, of course, we all do.
and then the screen scrolled text listing:
High School
TV/VCR repair
Computer programming
Electrician
Animal Care specialist
Auto mechanic
PC repair technician
Book keeping
Legal Assistant
Medical office management
Hotel/Restaurant mangement
Electronics
What I didn’t know as I watched those adds 15 – 20 years ago was that soon, I would be doing all those things. Welcome to the reality of living on a small farm. If it breaks, you fix it, and usually, no matter how much you simplify, something is always broken or will break when you need it.
I have a simple operation: a 1964 Farmall 706 gas tractor, an Artsway pasture mower, a 1989 Ford F150, a single row planter, and a 12 foot IH disc. For my habitat restoration, and general upkeep, that’s enough for me. As of today, the Ford needs a new battery (wouldn’t start today), the pto yoke broke last week on the mower, and I picked up new parts last night — and in the distant future, I need to put a hydraullic arm on the disk (I bought it used without one). The disk also needs two new tires, the curent ones are rotted for yeas of siting in the previous owner’s pasture.
So by my count, I have 24 tires, 7 batteries, 4 gasoline motors, four 2-cycle gas oil motors.
Something will break. It’s part of the Small Farm Life.
One of my current favorite books has this quote:
There is almost nothing an amateur working alone cannot do, from building a house or a barn or a shed to stretching a fence and hanging gates. And pitted against his constructive and orderly efforts are the familiar antagonists of a small farm — age, weathering, hard use by animals, and the consequences of altering the landscape.
A Very Small Farm
– William Paul Winchester
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