So God Made a Farmer

And on the eighth day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." 

So God made a farmer.

God said, "I need somebody willing to get up before dawn, milk cows, work all day in the field, milk cows again, eat supper, 

then go to town and stay past midnight at a meeting of the school board." 

So God made a farmer.

God said, "I need somebody willing to sit up all night with a newborn colt and watch it die, then dry his eyes and say,'Maybe next year,' I need somebody who can shape an ax handle from an ash tree, shoe a horse with hunk of car tire, who can make a harness out hay wire, feed sacks and shoe scraps. Who, during planting time and harvest season will finish his 40-hour week by Tuesday noon and then, paining from tractor back, 

put in another 72 hours." 

So God made the farmer.

God said, "I need somebody strong enough to clear trees and heave bales, yet gentle enough to yean lambs and wean pigs 

and tend the pink-comb pullets, who will stop his mower for an hour to splint the leg of a meadowlark."

It had to be somebody who'd plow deep and straight and not cut corners. Somebody to seed, weed, feed, breed, and brake, and disk, and plow, and plant, and tie the fleece and strain the milk, . Somebody who'd bale a family together with the soft, strong bonds of sharing, who would laugh, and then sigh and then reply with smiling eyes when his son says that he wants to spend his life 

doing what Dad does. 

So God made a farmer.

It has been one of the things Andrew has talked about over and over again this fall.  

"When can we figure out a time to make sure Henry can go back during harvest to ride around in the combine?" 

I get it.  

I hate coming home and smelling like cow poop and dirt.  It's hard to pack everyone up and travel three hours one way for a less than 24-hour trip with a toddler.  Farms aren't baby-proofed with loads of machinery, piles of metal, hotwire fences, cows, farm cats with claws, chemicals, tools and the like strewn about.  No one ever sleeps as well as they should.  I have hours of photos to edit.  Franklin needed a bath as soon as we pulled into the driveway, and Henry and I weren't far behind. 

But I get it now.

When you grow up making your way up and down, up and down, up and down those rows with your grandpa, with your dad...

you can't help but want that to be a part of your son too.  

So God Made a Farmer speech pulled from the 2013 Dodge Ram Super Bowl commercial...absolutely made both Andrew and I tear up the first time we saw it...originally from Paul Harvey.