Dear County Agent Guy

by Jerry Nelson

  The first ingredient: squid. It wasn’t bad, though. It sort of tasted like fish.

  The North Shore of Oahu is dotted with roadside food stands, many of which sell locally grown fruit. We stopped at such a stand to examine the offerings. I would probably just mangle a mango and figured I had best stay away from the passion fruit, since I’m a married man. What interested me most was the pineapple.

  I asked for a pineapple sample and was handed a golden wedge. My unsuspecting taste buds nearly had a coronary. The ultrafresh pineapple was sweet and tender and only vaguely similar to the canned stuff I had consumed all my life. It was so good, I nearly cried as the sugary juice dribbled down my chin.

  And that’s too bad, because now I’ll probably never again be able to stand canned pineapple. Consuming the fresh Hawaiian stuff has turned me into a pineapple snob.

  On our final night on Oahu, we all went to an establishment called Pinky’s Pupu Bar and Grill. Hawaii Boy and Adam again issued a challenge to me, this time with something called an “oyster shot.” A tall shot glass was placed before me. In it sat a raw oyster, topped with a dollop of cocktail sauce.

  I tossed the contents of the shot glass into my mouth and began to chew. “Gross!” exclaimed Hawaii Boy. “You’re not supposed to chew! You’re just supposed to swallow!”

  “How was it?” asked my wife after I’d finished.

  “Not bad,” I replied. “It sort of tasted like lutefisk.” •

  Part 3

  Never Kick a Fresh Cow Pie:

  Lessons Learned from a Lifetime of Dairy Farming

  A Dairy Farmer’s Vacation

  The aroma of warming dirt is like espresso to a farmer: His pulse races, he becomes wild-eyed, and his hair stands on end. This is why farmers wear seed corn caps.

  Some of the land that Dad and I farmed lay next to a highway. Sunny spring days would find us frantically rushing to get our crops planted on time. Off in the distance, I would see campers and boats gliding by on the highway and wondered how those folks could do that.

  What was wrong with them? Hadn’t they ever heard the expression “Make hay while the sun shines and early to bed early to rise and Rome wasn’t built in a day and if you chop your own wood it warms you twice and idle hands are the devil’s workshop”?

  On one such sunny spring day, Dad and I were tilling a field to prepare it for corn planting. As I turned my tractor at the end of the field, I saw that Dad’s tractor was sitting on the opposite headland. He had stopped work and had climbed down from his tractor cab and was gabbing idly with the neighbor, as if that field of corn were going to plant itself.

  I drove to the headland to see what was so important that Dad and the neighbor had to discuss it for half an hour. Just local gossip.

  I later mentioned this to Dad, and he said, “You should rest the horses at the end of the field.” I said his “horse” was made of steel and didn’t need any rest.

  “I wasn’t talking about the tractor,” he said.

  He had a point. A person shouldn’t be so consumed by making a living that he doesn’t have time to live. All work and no play sounds suspiciously similar to a chain gang.

  When I was a kid, Dad would make time at least once a summer to take us kids on fishing expeditions to a local lake. We had to be back home in time for evening milking, which means we originated the daycation.

  The morning of the fishing trip would find us rushing about like kittens in a roomful of yarn balls. There were preparations to make—the main one being casting practice.

  Our family owned exactly one fishing rod. It was equipped with an open reel, the kind that would snarl into a humongous knot on almost every cast. It took a while for each of us to get just one practice cast.

  We believed that the largest fish lived in the deepest water, which meant that casting farther equaled bigger fish. This is why we used a large square nut, which weighed half a pound, as a sinker.

  Shortly before we left for the lake, a couple of us kids dug for worms. As we dropped the slimy, slithery, subterranean invertebrates into a coffee can, I wondered about the wisdom of eating something that would eat such a thing.

  We piled into our 1959 Ford station wagon, drove to the lake, selected a likely spot on the shoreline, and commenced fishing operations. The ickiest part—baiting a razor hook the size of a crowbar—came first. None of the worms seemed pleased that they had been chosen to play a central role in our excellent adventure.

  The first cast was made, and the reel instantly snarled. When we finally got it untangled, we saw that the bobber was bobbing. The fishing line was spooled in and there was a bullhead on the hook! Woo-hoo! We fished that spot until we caught a dozen bullheads. Some were about four inches long, but we caught some small ones, too.

  I recalled this pleasant experience many years later when our sons were in grade school. Despite the fact that it was a wondrous spring day and we had way too many things that needed to be done around the farm, I decided to take the family fishing.

  My wife and I took the boys to a local discount store and outfitted them with new rods and snarl-proof reels. Live and artificial bait was purchased. Standing on the shore of a local lake, we made numerous soaring and tangle-free casts.

  But nothing. After drowning dozens of minnows, we switched to night crawlers and finally began to catch fish. What began as angling agony ended with fishing euphoria. All the fish were bullheads, of course. But we also landed some very excellent and sun-soaked memories.

  Over the years, no matter how much stuff we had to do on our dairy farm, we tried to keep alive Dad’s practice of taking quick little vacation-like daytime jaunts. My wife and I have become practiced “day-trippers.”

  As with most activities, being a day-tripper is a skill that requires constant honing. For example, one summer weekend some years ago, our youngest son, Chris, had a friend over for the weekend. Having a couple of fourteen-year-old boys around the house makes you feel like the guy who has been put in charge of the young carnivores at the zoo. We are talking about critters who are in perpetual motion, holding mock battles, testing each other’s strength, and pacing the floor when they become bored.

  “That’s enough!” I announced. “You boys are wearing out our nerves, not to mention the carpet! Everybody outside and into the car!”

  We herded the boys into our family sedan and set out with no particular destination in mind, just so long as it was fun, cheap, and close by. We wound up in the tiny hamlet of Garretson, South Dakota.

  Garretson has two major claims to fame. For one, it’s located near the red quartzite spires of Palisades State Park, and for another, it’s home to the renowned Devil’s Gulch.

  Devil’s Gulch, in case you’ve forgotten your Old West gangster history, is the spot where in 1876 the notorious outlaw Jesse James spurred his mount across a yawning rock chasm to escape a pursuing posse. It must have been the highlight of the week for Jesse, having botched the infamous Northfield, Minnesota, bank robbery a few days earlier. Two of his gang members were killed in the ensuing gun battle and two others were wounded, including Jesse’s brother, Frank.

  You can’t help but learn these educational things when you get the opportunity to travel, especially when you visit a town so proud of its history that it slaps up numerous signs depicting a desperado on his horse vaulting across a gulch.

  We decided to walk the footpath that loops around Devil’s Gulch. It was quite pleasant, except for the fact that Chris and his pal had to stop on occasion, go to the edge of the rocky precipice, and chuck pebbles into the abyss. The fact that there weren’t any guardrails didn’t bother them in the least, but it sure was tough on MY nerves.

  We finally found the fabled spot where Jesse James had jumped his horse across the gorge. A small bridge had been erected on the site to accommodate we non-horse-jumping pedestrians. The boys had to pause halfway across the br
idge to gawk at the creek that flowed lazily fifty feet below. Downstream boaters on Split Rock Creek probably noticed large numbers of “loogies” floating by that day.

  After we’d had enough of Garretson, we decided to return home via a different route and found ourselves meandering through a nondescript small town. My wife was driving (I always let her take the wheel; she can’t read maps and my peripheral vision isn’t all that good, so everybody wins), and I was staring blankly ahead. Without warning, an arm shot across my field of view.

  “Look at that!” she exclaimed. I swiveled my head to see what warranted such urgent attention. Her tone of voice had caused me to believe that she had just espied a horseback posse that was galloping alongside us and trading gunfire with a pair of fleeing bandits. But all I saw were houses.

  “Lookit that adorable Victorian! See that cute bay and the fancy turret?”

  “Watch the road, Ms. Stewart!” I ordered as the car swerved. “You’re gonna get nailed for DUIA: Driving Under the Influence of Architecture!”

  My wife and I then got into a heated discussion about safety versus scenery. No sooner had the dust settled than the backseat boys got squirrely and we had to threaten them with several child welfare violations. By the time we got home, everyone was tired and crabby and I was actually looking forward to spending some quality time with the cows.

  We continue to polish our day-tripping skills whenever possible. Because as Dad said that long-ago spring day on the headland of the cornfield, “You don’t get twice as much work from a horse by working him twice as hard.” •

  My Shameful Affair with the Farm Program

  Please, you must understand. Not necessarily forgive, but at least understand. After all, I am only human. I am just a man.

  The whole affair began innocently enough. I was a young farmer, just married, and my life may have appeared idyllic. But something was missing. Something was gnawing at the core of my happiness. I’m ashamed to admit it: I could not produce a profit.

  One day, when I went to the village for supplies, I ran into an old friend. We talked, and I shared with him my terrible secret. “Well,” he asked, “aren’t you enrolled in the Farm Program?” I told him no. He was surprised. “Everyone I know is in it. You’d better go check it out.”

  And so it was that I was introduced to that evil seductress they call the Program.

  At first, everything seemed too good to be true. The Program promised me much and asked but little in return. All she required was a small sacrifice: a tiny portion of land I must pledge to her. Idling perfectly good farmland is contrary to every fiber of a farmer’s being, but I quickly acquiesced. I was flush with excitement and eager to please my new paramour.

  I knew all about the Program’s sordid past. I knew that she bestowed her favors on hundreds—nay, thousands—of other farmers. I also knew that her “business partner” was the all-knowing, all-seeing government. But I told myself that I didn’t care. I pleaded to my wife that it was only for a season. Just this once, and then I would leave the Program. I swear!

  During that early time, I would lie awake nights, wrestling with unanswerable questions. What is this “deficiency payment”? Was it in fact a form of welfare? Had I become a kept man? By the next winter, I had made up my mind: no more Program! But then, out of the blue, she sent me a love letter, in an envelope with a cellophane window. There was a generous check inside.

  I was embarrassed by this overt flattery and uncomfortable about the check. But I found that I was able to cash the check despite my squeamishness. I began to see why the Program had so many admirers.

  Each winter, I swore to my wife that this was it, that this was the last year with the Program. Ah, but I underestimated the wiles of the Program. Sometime after Christmas, the mail would bring a leaflet describing, in tantalizing detail, all the new benefits being offered by the Program. I would hide the leaflet in the bathroom, poring over it for hours and hours like a kid with a Victoria’s Secret catalog.

  In the words of the flier, I could hear her siren song, so soft, yet oh, so sweet. It was more than any mortal man could bear. I would feverishly punch the numbers through my calculator, and the last shreds of my resolve would evaporate.

  When my wife was safely out of earshot, I would place a call to arrange a rendezvous. I would embrace the Program yet again, thrilling as she whispered words that sent shivers down my spine and into the very core of my checkbook. Phrases like “advance deficiency payment” and “nonrecourse marketing assistance loan” would put me into a swoon. And when it was over, we would bask in the afterglow and make promises to each other. In writing, of course. I would sign the triplicate forms and be on my way.

  Upon returning home, guilt would overtake me and I would try to hide the evidence from my wife. She would see the ink stains on my hands and rifle through my sock drawer until she found the contracts that I had just signed. “You promised!” she would cry. “You said that last year was the last year and that you would give up the Program! I can’t believe you anymore!”

  And that’s how it went, year after year, until a decade or more slipped by. The Program and I had a curious relationship. I recall one year when she asked me to not farm a third of my base acres. Preposterous! But as always, she wooed and enticed me. She offered me something called PIK certificates, which she said could be sold for cash or used to redeem grain that had been surrendered to the government under its commodity loan program. (The government doesn’t farm, so I assumed the grain was ill-gotten. I knew better than to ask.)

  That autumn, I was introduced to a kinky new move called “PIK and roll.” I won’t describe it here; suffice it to say that I am not proud of that period of my life.

  Sometime later, I received a letter that was different from any other she had sent. No check, no comforting message, but a demand: She wanted money. Specifically, she wanted me to return part of my advance deficiency payment. I went to her representatives and pleaded that I had no such monies, that they had been long spent. No problem, they said. They would simply subtract the funds from my future payments. That’s the Program for you. Always a class act.

  Then came word that Congress, the Program’s godfather, passed the sentence of death to my cherished paramour. As a punishment for her misdeeds, she would be forced to endure a lingering demise over a period of no less than seven years. Who but Congress could be so callous, so cruel?

  But Congress argues that it’s setting me free. I will be free, they say, to plant whatever and wherever I want, driven only by market forces. I can farm as God intended, unfettered by the whims of a capricious and half-witted Program.

  And that is true. But what keeps me awake nights now is this: I will also be free to suffer the slings and arrows of a fickle market and perhaps go bankrupt without my beloved Program. Will I stick with the Program these next few years? Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. How can I abandon her at a time like this? These precious years will be our last hurrah, our final fling.

  Perhaps many years hence, my wife and I will sit alone on a quiet evening. I will get that far-off look in my eye, and a single tear may roll down my cheek. I will be recalling that glorious day when I redeemed all those PIK certificates and spent endless hours frolicking in that truckload of wheat. Never was there such rapture, such profit. Those were the days.

  And my wife will know. She will know I am thinking of the Program and, as the song goes, “looking back and longing for the freedom of my chains and lying in [her] loving arms again.” •

  Out in the Trees

  I attended a family get-together recently. It was the kind of gathering where you sit around all day and drink coffee and chain-narf goodies while reminiscing about “the good old days.” Can you imagine my shock and surprise when somebody at the gathering had the audacity to suggest that we were poor back when we were kids? After all, we had trees!

  When I was growing up on our dair
y farm, our trees came to mean more to me than mere protection from the elements. They were the currency of my imagination, the lifeblood of my entertainment world.

  When pioneering homesteaders first arrived in this region more than a century ago, they found a prairie landscape that was as flat and barren as a stovetop. The homesteaders soon realized that our relentless prairie winds were more than just an annoyance; in the wintertime, a hard wind could be downright deadly. The pioneers began planting rows of trees around their homesteads, carrying buckets of water to the precious saplings during droughts, hopeful that the trees might begin to provide a windbreak within a decade or two. These shelterbelts, as they came to be known, are a living legacy that has been handed down to us from the pioneers.

  Trees can work miracles when the TV is on the fritz and your parents are about to go bonkers because you and your brothers are wrecking the house as you perform a home version of All-Star Wrestling.

  On such occasions, our parents would impolitely usher my two younger brothers and me out of the house and issue a stern edict: “Go outside and play awhile.”

  “Sheesh!” I would say to my brothers. “Bust one little light fixture and they give you the old heave-ho. C’mon, let’s go out to the trees.”

  We often felt sorry for kids who lived in town. Sure, they might have some trees on their lot, but just a handful or so. And yes, there were trees in the park, but they had to be shared with all the other kids in the neighborhood. How could you build a decent secret tree fort if a couple dozen other kids knew all about it?

  Thanks to the foresight of our farm’s homesteaders, we had trees to spare. We had so many that each of the eight kids in our family could claim a tree as his or her own personal favorite and would still have an embarrassment of riches left over. To a young boy with a vivid imagination, this bounty was the true measure of wealth.