Chapter 16

I took a deep breath and looked at her as I thought about her words and the way she said them, -"I was thinking about dropping the pill. What do you think?" Wow, talk about a loaded question. I took a deep breath and took my time, letting it out slowly, then I paused for a few seconds longer. Finally, I blinked, then looked her in the eyes.

"First off, you've taken me by surprise." I admitted. "Then I guess I'd like to know why you think quitting the pill right now is a good idea."

"Well, I think the hormones in the pill are screwing up the way my body works and trying to get that in balance is screwing up my thinking process." She said flatly. "And, since I'm not going to be taking any more classes, I was thinking we could move the wedding from August to a closer date if I did happen to get pregnant."

"Oh, I see." I was thinking rapidly. "Well, have you mentioned the idea to your mother?"

"Tom, my mother is pregnant and she's not exactly feeling comfortable about it right now. In fact, she's being so careful about this pregnancy that it almost scares me." She sighed softly and reached out a hand to me. "I look at Mom and Joe and I know that they wish they'd started to try to have a kid earlier because in some ways Mom's having a hard time of it. I don't want to be like that. I want to have a couple of kids now, while my body is still young enough to bounce back easily."

"I didn't know your mom was having a hard time." I frowned. "I thought she was quite happy about this pregnancy."

"Oh, she is, but at the same time, she's worried about it because of losing a baby in that stupid accident. On top of that, she's the one who advised me to have my babies when I'm young. She said she's having a lot more aches and pains now than she ever did when she was pregnant with me."

"Well, I suppose that's natural, but I don't think she expected you to want to get pregnant this early. I thought you'd at least wait until we were married before we started working on filling the house with kids."

"Two kids, and if possible a boy, then a girl." She smiled and held up the hand that wasn't grasping mine, extending two fingers. "One, two. Then I'll be happy."

"Can I think about this for a while?" I almost pleaded. "I mean, you could drop the pills and I could start using condoms I guess, at least until we're married."

"Jeez, Tom. You do want kids, don't you?"

"Yes Lisa-Marie, I do." I squeezed her hand in mine. "I want to have kids and I want you to be their mother, but right at the moment we aren't exactly settled in here. There are so many things we need to do..."

"Tom, this is a fucking farm." She snapped interrupting me. "There is always going to be something to do. If you plan on waiting until we aren't busy, we'll be ninety years old and retired before you let me get off the pill."

I couldn't help chuckling at her description of my cautious nature. She even grinned, although a moment before she'd been frowning.

"Well, it's true dammit." She snorted.

I laughed aloud and wrapped her in my arms to hug her tightly.

"Well, I'd like to get my feet settled on the ground as a farmer before we start a family, but if having a baby so soon is going to make you happy, I won't stop you. I was hoping to at least get in one growing season before you started popping out babies, but you're the one who is going to have the fat belly, not me." I said as I held her. "Why don't you talk to my mom and your mom to see what they think, then you can let me know what you decide?"

She was kissing me when the stupid phone rang. Since it was right behind me, I jumped, then grabbed the darn thing and felt like throwing it through the wall.

"Hello." I said sharply, trying not to sound too annoyed.

"Oops, did I catch you at a bad time?" Mom's voice asked.

"Only when I was necking with my woman." I had to grin and watched Lisa-Marie's face as she tossed her head to the side and looked at me in surprise. "What can I do you for?"

"Oh, I just phoned to see how everyone is doing." I could almost hear Mom's tentative smile. "I do miss you two around here, you know."

"We miss you too, Mom. Everything is going quite well here. Andrea seems to be as well as can be expected and Lisa-Marie has decided not to finish off that course she was doing. The snow is a pain. Other than that, nothing much is really worth any comment."

Lisa-Marie was making signs that she wanted to talk to Mom when I was done and I nodded to let her know that I knew what she meant.

It turned out that Mom was really calling to warn me about the weather. She'd just heard a warning on the radio about a fast-moving storm that was expected to drop about a foot of snow and was moving in quickly. Since we hadn't been paying any attention to the radio, I was taken by surprise, but the only worry I really had was about getting to school, especially since I wasn't looking forward to driving there in another blizzard.

When Lisa-Marie saw my frown, she gave me a questioning look and I covered the mouthpiece of the phone with one hand.

"Mom says that there's a blizzard on the way. Have you heard anything on the radio?"

"Sorry, no. I've had the radio on a music station. Just a minute, I'll see if I can get the CBC." She frowned, already moving toward the old radio that sat on the kitchen counter.

"It'd be better to get that country station from Calgary." I said, then uncovered the mouthpiece. "Mom, when did you hear about this storm?"

"Just a few moments ago, your Dad is going out to check on things right now."

"I think that's where I should be too." I sighed, then caught the radio broadcast.

"... and that was Reba McEntire singing 'You're The First Time I've Thought About Leaving' from her new album 'You Lift Me Up To Heaven'."

"Now for all the people who may be thinking of travelling almost anywhere in central and southern Alberta today, there is a severe weather warning in effect, so you might want to stay home and light a fire in the fireplace instead. The weather office has issued a blizzard warning for the next twelve to eighteen hours, advising that there will be heavy snows combined with extremely high winds throughout the forecast area. The police have advised people to stay off the roads if at all possible, which means... "

"Damn! Oops, sorry, Mom. I just heard the weather warning. I'm going to leave you to talk to Lisa-Marie. I'd better go check on things down at the barnyard. Thanks for calling and warning me, Mom. I'll talk to you later."

"Alright Tom. I'll be seeing you." I heard her saying as I handed the phone to Lisa-Marie.

Donning my cold weather gear, I went outside to find that the temperature had dropped in the last while and although the winds hadn't arrived yet, I could feel that strange calm we often got before a storm. I knew it was darn cold since I heard the snow squeaking under the soles of my boots and I hurriedly pulled on a pair of insulated gloves, wishing I had thought of buying some leather mittens with woolen liners.

My first worries were the cows that were in calf. They were being kept in the outdoor corral, but at least they had a decent shed to shelter them. I thought I'd add a few bails of fresh straw to their bedding as well as try to get them up and around for a few minutes. I knew that if it started to snow and blow hard, they wouldn't even get up to drink, let alone eat. My first thought was to check that their water supply was unfrozen. After that I tossed a half dozen bales of straw over the fence and into the pen, then started dragging them into the shelter, hauling two at a time by the bale strings.

By moving in amongst the cattle as I broke up the bales of straw and kicked the sections of the bales around to break them up, I gradually managed to get all of the cattle up and milling about. I knew that adding the fresh straw would help protect them from the cold when they settled back down. Besides, if they were disturbed, there was a good chance they might have a few sips of water and perhaps even a nibble of hay or a mouthful of ground grain from the feeder. Actually I was pleased at the number of cows that did have something to eat or drink.

It didn't take long to look after the cows, then I moved on the next pen which held only yearling cattle that were being fattened for sale. Since there were fewer of them, I wondered about how they'd fair in a prolonged storm, but after looking at the way they were all huddled into the back of the shed away from the open front, I didn't worry much. The bedding here didn't seem packed down as much either, so that was no worry. Although I did chase them to their feet, this batch didn't seem interested in either feed or water and by the time I'd moved out of the shed itself, they were all back inside. In fact a few of them had already laid back down in the bedding of deep straw.

There was only one more pen and shed outside that had any animals in it. That sheltered the two old plow horses that Uncle Silas had kept for sentimental reasons. As soon as I saw them, I knew that I didn't want to leave them out in the cold during this blizzard since it sounded like a bad one. Since I had a free double stall in the barn, I grabbed a rope that was hanging next to the corral gate and walked up to the old mare, knowing that she was the lead horse of the pair.

She tossed her head and whuffled as if she recognised me, then held her head toward me as I scratched her nose.

"What do you say, old gal? Want to spend a few nights in the barn?" I said quietly as I slipped the rope through the ring of her halter.

Taking both ends of the rope in one hand, I started leading her out of the corral, but she followed so closely that the rope never even tightened. Her partner, the old gelding, followed as if I was leading him too. So I simply walked to the barn, opened the door and led the first horse into the open double stall. Her mate walked in and took his place at her side, then snorted as if he was disgusted when he lowered his nose to his feed trough and found it empty.

I chuckled at that as I tied the mare with a short lead to her halter, then did the same to the gelding. While I was standing there between them, I carefully used my hand to scoop out the stale water in the automatic water bowl that hung in the middle of the double stall and let it refill, then scooped it out once more just to make sure their water was clean. As I walked away to close the outside door, I could hear the old mare already slurping at the fresh water.

I turned back with a smile, went to the fed bin, found a small bucket to fill with oats and a couple of sections from a fresh hay bale, then slipped back between bulging bellies of the old team to feed them. As I was shaking open the hay splits from the bale, the old mare used her nose to rub my arm as if saying thanks and I remembered seeing her do the same thing to Uncle Silas.

It's strange how one little thing like that can trigger a memory. I turned to the horse and scratched the spot that I just seemed to know was itching her. At the same time my mind took me back to a time before I'd even met Lisa-Marie.

I think I was about six when I'd first wheedled my mother into letting me stay with Uncle Silas for a few days. If I remembered right, it was at his instigation, so he'd gone right along with almost anything I'd said. It was the first time I'd been away from home, but I was staying with Uncle Silas, so it was okay. I think I stayed with him for three days before I became so homesick that he had to take me back to Mom, which was probably two more days than Uncle Silas expected me to last.

I remember trying my hardest to help Uncle Silas with whatever he was doing and I can still hear his voice as he patiently answered each and every one of the flood of questions that I asked him. Most of all though, I remember trying my best to help him as he hitched the team to an old stone boat which was nothing more than a few planks nailed down onto a pair of skids. Then we used that stone boat to clean out this very barn and the horses we'd used were the same team of horses that I was feeding now.

We'd load the stone boat up with manure from the barn and once we had gotten the horses to pull it outside the door of the barn, Uncle Silas would lift me onto the back of the mare.

"Use both hands and hold onto the shoulder strap." His gruff voice would command, then he'd smile up at me when I did.

The horse was so wide that my feet must have stuck almost straight out, but it didn't matter. I was on a horse and Uncle Silas was smiling up at me to let me know I was doing just fine. He'd walk back and stand with one foot on each skid of the stone boat, holding the reins of the horses in one hand and something he called a tether pole that poked straight up from a skid of the stone boat in the other.

"You ready Tommy?" He'd call.

"Yep." I'd answer, feeling like a giant with my head about eight feet off of the ground.

"Hayyah." He'd say loudly and the team would settle into the harness, then gradually build their speed to a slow trot with me bouncing and laughing on the mare's back as they dragged that old stone boat out to the field.

Once we were out to where he had spread other loads, his commands to the horses would start again. "Easy now, easy, slow now. That's it." He'd call as they slowed to a walk. Then he'd tie off the reins to his tether pole and step back to start spreading the manure with a fork as the horses slowly walked forward pulling that old stone boat along.

If he wanted them to change direction, he could do that from where he was working as well. "Gee" was the shout when he wanted them to go a little to the right and "haw" meant they'd move left. Of course a shout of "Whoa" brought them to a stop almost fast enough to throw me over the mare's shoulders. The way he controlled those horses with simple words was like magic to me and I loved every minute of it.

The way I bounced around on the back of those horses as they trotted back and forth from the field, along with the sounds and smells of the spring days that I spent with Uncle Silas were etched into my mind as some of my fondest memories. I spent several minutes, simply rubbing and petting those old horses as I thought about how much fun it had been to spend time with Uncle Silas, doing things the old-fashioned way.

The more I found myself thinking of what being a kid on the farm had been like, the more I had to grin. It would be great to show my own kids the wonders of the sights and sounds that were part of living on a farm, but first Lisa-Marie and I had to have kids, didn't we? Maybe Lisa-Marie should throw her pills away after all? I broke into laughter and slapped the old mare on the flank as she tried to squeeze me between her and her teammate when I moved to leave them.

"I'll come back and talk to you later, you old reprobate." I grinned. "I think you just prevented an argument."

I'll swear that old horse snorted in response and I had to laugh at the thought of the old mare talking to me. I was whistling as I gathered the few eggs the chickens had laid and tossed the old sow some more bedding then watched her root it around until she'd built it into a pile to lie on. After that, I threw a bit of hay to the cows and decided there wasn't much more I could do for the animals before the storm arrived.

When I went outside, it felt warmer, but the wind was picking up and a few large flakes of snow were falling. I glanced at my watch and swore softly to myself, thinking that it was still too early to head back to the college, but knowing that if I waited I was possibly going to be snowed in for a few days.

As I stepped inside the house and set down the few eggs I'd found, I realised that I'd forgotten the bucket of skim milk for the old sow when I'd gone out earlier. I grabbed it and headed back to the barn. To my surprise as I opened the door, the old mare let out a nicker of greeting and I had to chuckle to myself. Uncle Silas had always said that horse was half dog and that greeting seemed to me to almost prove it.

I smiled as I added some ground grain to the skim milk and then slopped it into the old sow's trough. That got her to her feet in a hurry. Even watching that mean old sow guzzle the sloppy mixture while making sloppy smacking sounds punctuated with occasional grunts seemed satisfying to me. Tempting fate and risking a vicious bite, I reached over the fence and scratched the old beast behind an ear for a moment. I grinned as I watched her back stretch out and felt her head push against my hand as she demanded that I scratch even harder.