Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Part One - SLEEPLESS IN STICKSVILLE
Chapter One - CLUCKSTER’S LAST STAND
Chapter Two - STAYING ABREAST IN THE BOONIES
Chapter Three - RUNAROUND SUE
Chapter Four - WHEN IT RAINS, IT PAWS
Chapter Five - DRESSED TO KILL
Chapter Six - WHO SAYS YOU CAN’T GO HOME?
Chapter Seven - THE COWPOKE WORE PRADA
Chapter Eight - BRUMFIELD FOLLIES
Chapter Nine - THE LAND THE TAKEOUT TAXI FORGOT
Chapter Ten - COCK-A-DOODLE SUE
Chapter Eleven - JEREMIAH WAS A PEEPING TOM
Chapter Twelve - SUPERMODEL SUZY
Part Two - THE COUNTERFEIT FARM GIRL GETS REAL
Chapter Thirteen - CALVES’ HEADS AND BLACK SNAKES AND GROUNDHOGS. OH, MY!
Chapter Fourteen - COMING AROUND TO COUNTRY
Chapter Fifteen - THE MOTHER OF ALL REALITIES
Chapter Sixteen - THERE OUGHTA BE A PILL
Chapter Seventeen - DEATH BY FAMILY TIME
Chapter Eighteen - AH, THE WONDERS THAT AWAIT ME IN MY WHIRLPOOL
Chapter Nineteen - SUZY SOPRANO
Chapter Twenty - STAR OF STAGE, SCREEN, AND LIVESTOCK EXCHANGE
Chapter Twenty-one - MY BIRTHDAY MEANS JACK
Chapter Twenty-two - AIN’T NO WAY TO TREAT THE LADIES
Chapter Twenty-three - IT’S OKAY, PHIL. YOU’LL GET MY BILL.
Chapter Twenty-four - JUST ANOTHER BLUE-GENED BOY
Chapter Twenty-five - JAMMIN’ WITH THE JONAS BROTHERS
Chapter Twenty-six - SWAN LAKE? NOT SO MUCH. BUT SWAN POND SOUNDS ABOUT RIGHT.
Chapter Twenty-seven - FORBIDDEN IN FAUQUIER
Chapter Twenty-eight - CHRISTMAS IN COW COUNTRY
Chapter Twenty-nine - YOU SAY YOU WANT A RESOLUTION
Part Three - WILL FARM FOR LOVE
Chapter Thirty - WILL FARM FOR LOVE
Chapter Thirty-one - I’D LIKE TO HAVE A WORD WITH JOHN WAYNE*
Chapter Thirty-two - FAILING CAREGIVING 101
Chapter Thirty-three - DRAWING THE LINE AT THE LEECH
Chapter Thirty-four - PLEASE DON’T SQUEEZE THE STINKBUGS
Chapter Thirty-five - THE GUILT IS IN THE MAIL(BOX)
Chapter Thirty-six - NAILING THE NEW NORMAL
Chapter Thirty-seven - LOOKING FOR DICK IN ALL THE WRONG PLACES
Chapter Thirty-eight - NEEDY AND NOT PROUD OF IT
Chapter Thirty-nine - PUZZLED BY KUDZU? ME, TOO.
Chapter Forty - ONE CHOLECYSTECTOMY, THREE ERCPS, AND SIX DEAD CHICKENS LATER . ...
Chapter Forty-one - I’M DREAMING OF A WHITE CHRISTMAS TREE. NOT.
Chapter Forty-two - IS THAT A POINSETTIA IN YOUR POCKET, OR ARE YOU JUST GLAD ...
Chapter Forty-three - COCK-A-DOODLE SUE, PART TWO
Chapter Forty-four - JAILBIRD IN A SCRUFFY BLUE BATH TOWEL
Chapter Forty-five - PUTTING MY FAITH IN THE FUNNY STUFF
Part Four - EPILOGUE 500 ACRES AND NO PLACE TO HIDE
Acknowledgements
Praise for
Confessions of a Counterfeit Farm Girl
“Packed with droll humor . . . McCorkindale’s memoir is a witty take on what happens when you try to ‘take the girl out of New Jersey.’”
—Booklist
“A rollicking, Green Acres–esque memoir.”
—Working Mother
“[McCorkindale] calls herself counterfeit but she is truly the real thing; witty, startling social commentary in a flawless voice.”
—Laura Collins, author of Eating with Your Anorexic
“Witty, devilish, honest, and laugh-out-loud funny. Susan tells it like it is.”
—Petroville
“The author is at her funniest when recounting her faux pas: assuming that ‘riding’ meant the subway, or not knowing what address to give the 911 operator (numberless estate name or P.O. box?). Her prose is chatty and upbeat.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Deserves five John Deere tractors, an appropriate equivalent of five stars. The author is edgy and funny, and pulls no verbal punches.”
—Middleburg Life (VA)
“Nothing could be more amusing than reading about a shoe-loving, makeup-wearing, once-a-week-hair-salon-visiting, manicure-sporting New York City marketing director finding herself on 500 acres of prime cattle farm. Especially when the story is written by Susan McCorkindale, a woman with . . . wonderful self-deprecating humor and wit.”
—The Trumpet Vine
“Confessions is 350 pages of fall-down-funny anecdotes of Susan’s adventures on the cattle farm she and her family now run.... Susan’s sense of humor is as divine on paper as it is in person. Her style is unique and elevating and can be best described as Nora Ephron, only closer to home.”
—Warrenton Lifestyle Magazine
NEW AMERICAN LIBRARY
Published by New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,
Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2,
Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell,
Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)
Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre,
Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632,
New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue,
Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published by New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, August 2011
Copyright © Susan McCorkindale, 2011
All rights reserved
REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA
Library of Congress Cataloging-In-Publication Data:
McCorkindale, Susan.
500 acres and no place to hide: more confessions of a counterfeit farm girl/
Susan McCorkindale.
p. cm.
ISBN : 978-1-101-51711-6
1. McCorkindale, Susan—Homes and haunts—Virginia. 2. Farm life—Virginia.
3. Urban-rural migration—Virginia—Case studies. 4. Urban women—Virginia—Biography.
5. Women—Virginia—Biography. 6. Virginia—Biography. I. Title.
II. Title: Five hundred acres and no place to hide.
CT275.M4155A3 2011
975.5’043092—dc22
[B] 2011009611
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
Penguin is committed to publishing works of quality and integrity. In that spirit, we are proud to offer this book to our readers; however the story, the experiences and the words are the author’s alone.
While the author has made e
very effort to provide accurate telephone numbers and Internet addresses at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
http://us.penguingroup.com
For Nancy and Doug
Author’s Note
This work is a memoir. For the sake of storytelling purposes and pace, aspects of the time line have been compressed. In addition, certain names and identifying characteristics have been altered out of respect for people’s privacy. Of course, certain other names and identifying characteristics have not been altered. This doesn’t mean I don’t respect those people’s privacy, just that I couldn’t resist telling the world how wonderful they are. By the end of this book, I believe you’ll love them as I do. But that doesn’t mean you should friend them on Facebook. Following them on Twitter is fine.
“Parenthood: that state of being better chaperoned
than you were before marriage.”
—MARCELENE COX,
TWENTIETH-CENTURY HUMORIST
“Nowhere to run to, baby, nowhere to hide.”
—MARTHA REEVES AND THE VANDELLAS
Prologue
TO: Friends and family
FR: [email protected]
Date: Wednesday, 10:35 a.m.
Subject: Nemo Knows Best
About the salmon farm. Hemingway1 and I have decided that Nemo knows best: fish are friends, not food.2 And so, much to the dismay of the livestock on our five-hundred-acre beef cattle farm, we’re not swapping the tractor for salmon tanks just yet. We’re staying right here in the middle of nowhere with the cows and the bulls and the goats and the hens.
God, how I hate the hens.You’d think that over the past few years we’d have figured out how to live together. But no.They despise me and, frankly, I find them pretty distasteful, too. Unless they’re breaded and deep-fried, fricasseed, broiled, barbecue grilled, or roasted with a dash of rosemary. Then I like’em just fine.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Before I launch into my foul relationship with our fowl, let me take a second to bring you up to speed.
Back in the summer of 2004, on a day so sweltering hot I’d have given anything (my favorite pair of Guccis, a kidney, maybe even one of my kids) to get back into our air-conditioned car, I let my handsome, former marine husband convince me to walk away from a six-figure job as marketing director of Family Circle magazine and move to the country. I admit I was burned out at the time and a stint—a short stint—in the sticks sounded like it might be refreshing, rejuvenating, and really good fodder for cocktail-party conversations when we came to our senses and returned to suburbia.
The thing is, we haven’t returned to our senses3 or suburbia yet, and it doesn’t look like we’ll be doing so anytime soon. Not that this bothers our sons, Casey and Cuyler.4 If anything, they’re fine with not going back to the ’burbs, and thrilled we’re not trading our pitchforks for fishing poles. Casey because he’s finally figured out that our back fifty is the perfect place for paintball, and Cuyler because he’s got big plans for his five-hundred-acre playground “when Uncle Doug gives it to me for graduation.”5 The idea, according to my younger son, is to get an agricultural degree from Virginia Tech, make a living raising Black Angus cattle, and then supplement his income by hosting Civil War reenactments on the weekends.
You’ve got to love a little boy with a business plan.
It’s a good thing someone’s thinking about the future, because in all honesty? When I’m not staring out at the cows and pining for the days of expense-account lunches at Smith & Wollensky steakhouse, afternoon Starbucks breaks, and a designer footwear collection that rivaled a DSW, I’m thinking about the present. And trying not to have a panic attack.
Despite my mixed emotions about the farm, life in the boonies has netted me some neat new skills (come on, I’ll show you how to band a bull!), a great new group of girlfriends, and a whole new career as a writer.
Of course, Hem says I don’t write as much as rant about country stuff that drives me crazy, and about that he might be right.
He also says someday I’m going to regret my ranting and wish I could take it all back. And about that he might really be on the money.
I already feel bad about not painting a rosier picture of life here in the hinterland. I can’t believe I didn’t celebrate the snakes in the cellar, the mice in the utensil drawer, and the stinkbugs scurrying across my forehead while I was trying to sleep. I can’t believe I didn’t pledge to learn to make my own jam, can my own tomatoes, or wield a power jerky blaster. I can’t believe I didn’t replace my Spode dinnerware with the John Deere collection that Tractor Supply carries, or learn to drive a tractor, ride a horse, or bag a buck. I can’t believe I didn’t embrace NASCAR and Toby Keith, denounce the New York Giants, and stock up on Redskins jerseys.
And I certainly can’t believe I bitched on paper about the bizarre attire that passes for women’s fashion in these parts.
Oh, Lord, do you think it’s too late to trade my stilettos for work boots and develop a taste for pulled pork? Is it too late to change my tune and say I absolutely, positively love life on the farm, or at least make one last push for us to move to the salmon farm?
As my dear friend Trish would say, “Sorry, Suz, that train has left the station.” If it’s got a bar car, I’d damn well better hop on.
Love,
Susan
Part One
SLEEPLESS IN STICKSVILLE
“There are good days and there are bad days, and this is one of them.”
—LAWRENCE WELK
Chapter One
CLUCKSTER’S LAST STAND
I have a confession to make: I’ve adopted an “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em—at least a little” attitude about farm life. I don’t know if I’ll ever love it, but I won’t know if I don’t try, right? Besides, it gives Hem a kick to see me pitching in to herd cattle, haul feed, or put in a fence post. And the fact that I’m doing it in heels only makes him laugh harder.
Today, for instance, I’m gardening. Replanting the window boxes counts as gardening, doesn’t it? Hemingway packed them full of pansies and petunias in the spring, but since then the pansies have passed on, done in by both the warm weather and the last of our psycho chickens.
Apparently one night while we slept, the Great Banty Bloodbath took place in our side pasture. How we didn’t hear the screaming and fluttering and flinging of eggs in the face of the attacker is beyond me, though I suppose it has something to do with the fact that Hemingway and I went to bed really late. See, my favorite farmer built a burn pit in the backyard, and on cooler evenings we stay up snuggling by the fire and talking about everything we need to do the next day. Of course, come morning we’re too exhausted to do half of what we discussed, so maybe what we should really do is fill in the burn pit. But honestly, who has the energy?
In any case, when Casey went out to water and feed our crazy fowl, he discovered the carnage. Something—maybe it was a fox, maybe it was a raccoon, maybe someday I’ll give a rat’s ass6 what it was—ripped our pretty rooster to shreds, and murdered six of our remaining ten hens. A seventh died later of her injuries.
So now we’ve got three cuckoo birds left and they absolutely, positively will not return to the coop. Who knew chickens could suffer post-traumatic stress disorder? Instead, they’ve commandeered one of the window boxes on the porch. It’s there that they sleep, poop, and lay the occasional egg. Seriously. They lay, like, once a week. I
f I were running a bakery, I’d go belly-up. Oh, well. One more reason to thank God I can’t cook.
The hens’ favorite window box faces the site of the pullet pogrom. They sit in it, root their freaky four-toed feet around in it, stare at the empty coop, and cluck. And peck at themselves and one another. Until somebody gets pissed off. Really pissed off. In no time there’re feathers 6. Ooh, maybe it was a rat! flying, potting soil sailing over the side, and all the pansies and petunias are pushing up daisies.
Which is how I came to be replacing them today.
Usually, Hemingway does this stuff. But since I made the mistake of actually telling him about my plan to sorta, kinda get my farm game on, he said, and I quote, “Who are you and what have you done with my wife?” And then he ran off to Bush Hog6 before I could back out.
Out. How I’d love to be out—for a pedicure or a latte, or just a quick look-see at Lou Lou.7 (I swear I won’t buy as much as a hair band!) But that’s a daydream for another day. Right this sec I’m imprisoned on my porch until Cluckster and her pullet pals make their move.8
500 Acres and No Place to Hide Page 1