Category: Raised by a village

Posted in Off the Farm

Oklahoma for Thanksgiving 2016

Posted on by Janet

Thanksgiving travel can be stressful. Years ago, I traveled on Thanksgiving through LAX to visit my brother Marty in California. I swore I’d never fly over Thanksgiving again; this is where you laugh and remind me never to say “Never”. 

In July of this year, Jim said that he’d like to visit his sister and niece in Oklahoma over Thanksgiving. I stared at him in shock. The last time we flew to Oklahoma (in 2010) he nearly had an anxiety attack watching the door close inside the plane.  Seating him near the window on the next leg of the trip seemed to help, but we ended that trip in 2010 with sentiment  of never flying again. He even flew in the Navy.  So, when he said he wanted to fly to Oklahoma, I was overjoyed! Let the planning begin. 

With tickets booked on non-stop flights, I sent emails to friends and family a week prior to our trip regarding the care of animals and the house.  To avoid nightmarish parking, we arranged for our friend Lisa to dogsit and to provide airport shuttle.  By the time I sat on the plane, my mind shut off.  Jim was just getting started.  He chatted, watched the baggage handlers, and once in the air, he actually napped. I knitted. I’d been up past midnight finishing my family’s  annual calendar, and I was beyond exhausted. 

We arrived safely at the Will Rogers Airport in Oklahoma City and were met by Jim’s niece and husband. We enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving meal with family. We laughed as their dog attempted turkey telekinesis and failed. 

That night, I slept for over 8 solid hours. Friday, after giving the English Butterfly Bunny a pedicure, we took a spur-of-the-moment road trip to Fort Worth, Texas to visit another niece whom Jim had not seen in 35 years. 

We stopped near Gene Autry, OK for pictures near the huge wind turbines.

 I slept most of the way back and vaguely remember stopping at McDonald’s where Jim bought an apple turnover for the first time in 25 years.  It felt more like an odd dream.

Some time after midnight, we drove through the city, already decorated with holiday lights, and we stopped at Oklahoma City National Memorial site. This national memorial stands where the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building was bombed by a domestic terrorist in 1995.  We visited the memorial in 2010 during the day, and I was moved to tears. Now, after midnight six years later, I saw the Memorial in the stillness of the cold night air, where lighted bronze chairs symbolize each life lost on that tragic day. The pool of water reflects the times of 9:01 and 9:03 marking the moments when that rental truck exploded in April 1995 and sent shock waves through our nation. I felt the chilled night air and peace. Now, in the dark, standing at the reflecting pool, I heard and felt the laughter of children dancing on the water. Looking around, I was completely alone in the physical plane…yet, I felt the presence of others. I asked our niece about my experience Saturday morning and she said, “if you felt that, then the memorial did its job. You felt the people who lost their lives. They are not forgotten.” I had been standing near the spot where the daycare had been in the federal building. It’s one experience to stand where people worked and played in the daylight; it’s a completely different experience at night. I am in awe of this tribute to our fallen fellow Americans. Infants, children, mothers and fathers, family members who never made it home from work; they are not forgotten. 

My Ubuntu sister, Susan, drove down to meet us on Saturday. We traveled to Cambodia in 2015 and will forever have that bond.

We spent a few hours shopping at small businesses around the city like the Savory Spice Shop (where they grind fresh herbs and spices) and Ingrid’s Kitchen  (a German Restaurant) where I tasted Weiner Schnitzel . ..how have I missed out on my heritage’s food all these years? 

We are now planning birthday lunches to be at local German restaurants in North Carolina!

Spending time with Jim’s family is a special gift. We arrived home on a smooth flight,  checked animals and unpacked. We’re already thinking ahead to next year and getting  more of his family together in one spot for the holiday. 

Posted in Raised by a village

Spiders… Best Served Under My Shoes

Posted on by Janet

Walking out of the ladies’ room at work, a coworker spotted a spider lowering itself from the ceiling.  As she ducked beneath it and returned to her desk, I waited for the tiny gray arachnid to lower itself within my reach.  Unable to find a piece of paper or tissue, I removed my sandals and smacked the spider at 5 feet in the air. Several coworkers shook their heads, others laughed and one applauded.  

It’s not the first time that I’ve killed a spider or other crawling insects with my shoes.  There was the time in graduate school class where a huge palmetto bug scurried across the auditorium floor.  This caused three cohorts to quickly move their chairs.  I stood, walked up a level and squished the huge winged-roach with my shoe.  The professor stopped and said, “and that ladies is an example of leadership.”  A few years earlier, while enjoying dinner with friends in a now-closed rustic pub, a wolf-spider jumped onto the table after we paid the check.  My friend Joci tried to climb over Becky in the booth while I stood up, ripped off my sandal and pounded the spider in front of the waitress and several confused patrons.  The manager hurried over and asked if there was a problem.  Joci said, “Yes, you should call an exterminator. Otherwise, you’ll need to get Janet to walk around and offer her services.”  The pub closed shortly thereafter citing renovations and new management.

I know that spiders eat insects and are beneficial little creatures, but when they expand their webs across pasture fences, I imagine that they’re writing my name and sending messages to their spider friends.  I’ve lost count of the number of times walking woods or a barn and get smacked in the face by a web of sticky invisible thread.  Arms spastically flailing, I grab at my hair to remove the web and have nightmares for a week of being chased by crawling, jumping arachnids. I’m just a little flinchy sometimes.

Posted in Raised by a village

I Punched a Shark

Posted on by Janet

As I walked into the jewelry store, the associate asked me, “what did you do to your ring this time?” 

“I punched a shark. I think I damaged the prongs.” 

Another patron looked at me quizzically and asked, “why did you hit your vacuum cleaner?” 

I shook my head and said, “a real shark, in the ocean.”

This got their attention.  In 2015, the number of shark sightings seemed to be higher than normal. Warm waters and dry weather made the creatures brave enough for shoreline visits. Even with the news, people at Myrtle Beach continued to fill the shallow surf, enjoying the warm salt water.  I waded out to waist deep and stood with my friend Joci and her 5 year old son. Joci remarked that she needed to take her sunglasses to shore. Jake and I waited a few moments, then decided to go and finish a sand castle. I turned south and caught my breath, stumbled and shoved Jake toward the shore when I saw the two rows of teeth rise out of the water. It was heading toward us. I could hear Joci screaming, “Shark! Get Jake!” In that moment, I grabbed Jake with my right hand, shoved him toward the shore, turned toward the shark and started punching the water with my left fist. I made contact with something near my left leg while half-walking-half- swimming backward toward the shore. Something scraped my ankle and then it was gone. We tripped in the waves and then were on the sand. Commotion, confusion and words of a lifeguard, “don’t panic, it was only a sand shark.”  I tilted my head at him and asked, “an 8 foot sand shark with grayish white rust-spotted mouth and two rows of teeth?! Hardly.” He looked at me and tried to clear the surf of swimmers. 

We packed up and headed inside. I was done with swimming in the ocean where we are just visitors. I looked at my trembling hands and realized that I was wearing my engagement ring and wedding band as I rarely remove them. “I must have looked like a fishing lure with the stone sparkling under water! That was dumb of me!”

We wiped the scratch on Jake’s knee and didn’t say the word “shark” around him. A few weeks later, he went for a checkup and the pediatrician asked, “have you had a good summer buddy?” Jake replied, “yeah, I got bitten by a shark.” The doctor chuckled,  but when he saw Joci’s face, he checked the healed scratched and reported that all was well. 

My ring was repaired then and again in March when I caught it on a goat’s horn. Maybe I should find a non-sentimental ring to wear!

This year, I went back to the beach for a few days and ventured into the warm Carolina coastal waters. Yet, I never relaxed as I fought heavy currents, watched for dorsal fins and rubbed sand on jellyfish stings. 

Posted in farmlife, goatlife, Raised by a village

You Get a Collar! You Get a Collar! Giveaways on the Farm….

Posted on by Janet

In all those years of 4-H cow showmanship contests, I garnered white-participation ribbons and learned to appreciate 16th place. Now, decades later, the skills paid off…in goats. 

Catching goats is worse than herding cats. With their sharp horns and cheetah-like sprints, we quickly tired of grabbing horns and chasing them like a rogue version of a ninja warrior television show. Animal scientist, Temple Grandin calls goat horns the “no-fly zone” for human touch. 

There had to be a better way. Faith Hill weighs at least 45 pounds and the other night, I picked her up, and she smacked her horn into my jaw. I thought I was going to lose a tooth. 

That night, I watched a video by K-N-S Farm of the lady using a dog harness for her blind goat, and I finally saw the light. A quick trip to Tractor Supply after work the next day, and I scored a goat halter, lead, and a medium dog collar. We cornered Faith Hill in the barn, and I added the pink collar.  She allowed me to walk and coax her to the milking stanchion.  

Once we had her head secured, I added the halter.  She stood for milking and when we released her head, I held the lead, walked her down the stanchion, and around the pasture.  

This small success involved an ancient trick of bribing the her with a bowl of feed and a treat. My technique works now, but all those years ago, judges in the fairground exhibition ring found my tactic to be completely wrong. As a youngster, I watched in frustration as all the other 4-Hers easily maneuvered their cows into straight lines like dog handlers at Westminster; my stubborn calf wanted to find the nearest bucket of feed…in the stand with the spectators. Mortified, the judges handed me a white ribbon, and I think one may have muttered something about not coming back.  That calf, known by her number ,”583″,  grew up to be a milking cow who was always first in line at milking times, and she didn’t mind being handled by us humans. 

I certainly would have never imagined that all those failed attempts at cow showmanship would one day be a shining moment in our milking time with goats. 

After my next trip to Tractor Supply, it’s going to be like an Oprah Winfrey car-giveaway-episode on the farm when I go to the pasture saying,  “You get a collar..and you get a collar…and you get a collar!”

Photos courtesy of Kelly Reep. 

Posted in farmlife, Raised by a village

Here, Hold My Goat

Posted on by Janet

Goat  “Faith Hill” and baby buckling “Jim Cantore”

“What is that smell?”  I sniffed the air, then my arms and hands.  “It’s me! I smell like a goat!”  I grimaced at my rain-soaked shirt drenched in sweat, dirt, feces and goat milk. It was July 4th, and the humidity was rising to fierce levels. 

It had been over 20 years since I smelled that combination.  It’s a smell that hid in the recesses of my mind once I moved away from the dairy farm as a young adult.  Now, with a small herd of goats, the smell engulfed me.  My brother Kelly and I spent the morning walking the fence line, cutting tree limbs off the fences that had fallen during the previous night’s storm.

My goat named Faith Hill had just given birth to a buckling the previous week,  and he was only nursing on one side. 

Goats have an udder with two teats, but the milk is compartmentalized, so if the kid only eats on one side, the udder is lopsided and full.  If not milked out, i feared that the goat could develop mastitis (an inflammation and infection of the udder).  Without a stanchion to hold the goat, Faith Hill refused to stand still so I could relieve the pressure from her udder.  I looked at Kelly and said, “If I grab her, will you hold her while I milk her?”  He said, “Sure, why not.”In one quick motion, I grabbed the nanny goat by her horns, and Kelly lifted her on to a crate.  He held her, and I milked into a jar.  Unlike cows, the goat lifted her hoof, pawed at my arm and knocked my cup of warm milk to the ground.  “Crap!”  I exclaimed.  Kelly said, “Hold her leg.”  I said, “eww, it’s wet and covered with dirt!”  He laughed and said, “Mamaw used to milk Susie the cow, and it had stuff in it before she strained it.”

I muttered, “How do I know she’s finished?”  Kelly replied, “You’ll figure it out.”  Sure enough, a few minutes later, the goat’s teat and side of her udder felt flaccid and withered. She was done.

A few weeks later, my friend Joci came to visit the goats, and I realized that Faith’s udder was once again filled, because the buckling was not nursing from both sides. I looked at her and said, “Here, hold my goat.”  I grabbed the nanny, and together we lifted her to the crate.  I repeated the process of milking that smelly gray and white horned animal.  This time, she patiently stood while this stranger held her horns.  With her back leg, she scratched my wrist and her own udder… which required a quick spray of Blue-Kote… the same magical spray that I’ve used on myself!

In August, my friend Lisa stopped by for a surprise Sunday visit.  When the rainstorm stopped, I looked at my teenaged godson and asked, “Want to hold my goat?”  He looked up from his phone and said, “Aunt Janet, I think I’m really tired.” 

I laughed, “aw, c’mon, you know you want to hold the goat.” 

Finally, we convinced him to go outside and he did hold the goat, for about 30 seconds. Then, Lisa took over and we laughed as 3 goats tried to eat snacks and I milked out another 1/2 quart of milk. 

Now, it’s September, and Jim just finished the goat stanchion last week. It’s a daily thing to milk the goat now.  Stay tuned for more of the goat milking adventures!

Photos courtesy of Kelly Reep and Jim Morgan.

Posted in farmlife, goatlife, Raised by a village

As The Goat Turns

Posted on by Janet


We welcomed 2 new goats to the farm.. Sam, the yearling buck, and a yet to be named year-old female who happens to be Faith Hill’s daughter. 

Any suggestions on names for the new gal? She has one white side, two black circles on the other side, a black neck and head with fawn-brown legs. 

Buckling Jim Cantore went to be a growing stud on the farm where he was conceived. 

Posted in Raised by a village

We Agreed to Take Two Barn Cats

Posted on by Janet

“Which two are ours?” I asked. 

“All 5 of them.” Sue replied.

“No, which two?”

“All of them. Mama, Soot, Tink, Tortuga, and Wu-Ting. They’re a family.”

I backed away from the van and ran to the house, “Jim! I need you!”

Jim walked out of the house and into the driveway where Sue, a kind-hearted lady, stood in front of her 1980s model van filled with five cat carriers, and five scared hissing feral cats peered at us. 

Sue looked at Jim and said, “thank you so much for opening your home to these cats. I found them I a parking lot last winter. They’ve been fixed, but no one wants them since they’re not kittens.”

Jim quizzically looked at the caged animals and asked, “so which two are we taking?” 

“All of them.” Sue repeated as she swept her hand in the air like a hostess on ‘The Price is Right’. Jim shook his head and said, “so you just want to let them out now?” 

“Oh no. We’ll set them up in the barn, and I’ll feed them each day for two weeks so that they know where home is. Then, we’ll  release them so they won’t run away. They’ll be frightened. And I brought 50 pounds of cat food.”

Jim said, “ok, we’ll see.” Sue drove to the barn to set-up these hissing cats in the tack room as I stood outside the barn in shock. We agree to take two…and we were looking at five. 

Each day, for two weeks, Sue stopped by and fed the hissing, growling felines. They hated me. On the 14th day, Jim and Sue opened the cages, and the cats ran into the woods. At night, I saw 5 pairs of eyes in the woods, watching me. Then I only saw 4…and three…until finally, a year later, Soot and Tink are the only remaining feral cats who will stay in the barn, catch mice and wait for feeding time. 

Wu-Ting tried to drive a firetruck and Tortuga lost a fight with a coyote. Mama-cat appears once a month, but after a year, we have two barn cats. And Mia isn’t happy. 

Soot now waits quietly nearby for food
Tink still hisses
Posted in Raised by a village

Where’s the Heat?

Posted on by Janet

In the 1984, the Wendy’s fast food commercial made Clara Peller a household name and iconic symbol with her line, “Where’s the beef?”  In March 2015, I traveled to Cambodia as a short term missionary team member with the United Methodist Women Ubuntu Journey program.   It was 98 degrees in March!  That’s not a normal, comfortable temperature for that time of year.  Now, it’s June and we’re experiencing a drought, with temperatures rising to 100 degrees each day.  Again, this is not quite the normal comfortable upper 80s that we usually have in June.  Last year, it rained nearly every week and the temperatures stayed in the 70s and 80s.  Friends complained that they did not think it was actually summer.  I graduated with my Masters degree in August on a beautiful summer day without the weather being scorching hot.  This year, it’s a different story.  It’s June and we have not had rain in over two weeks.  The corn looks like the tops of pineapples and the chickens are panting; I never knew that chickens could pant like dogs.  How often do we pray for rain, cooler weather, warmer weather, sun, a cool breeze, or a cloud?

Just now, a bolt of lightning filled the sky, and I counted, “One thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three, one thousand four…” and a clap of thunder filled the night air.  The dog suddenly wants to sit in my lap for consolation from that loud thunder.  And there it is, the sound of a Corinthian wind chime holding long the melodious tone as it sways in the long-awaited breeze bringing drops of ground-thirsty rain.  The temperature outside has already started to drop and the night promises to be cooler than the last two weeks.  It’s funny how we will pray for wind, like a soft breeze, not too much that will mess my hairstyle or cause a house to suddenly fly from Kansas to Oz.

This weather reminds me of Cambodia, where I rode on the front deck of a boat along the Tonle Sap River to see the floating village.  As the wind blew on my face and the river water splashed along the sides of the boat, the sun’s rays beat down on my arms and face. My head was covered with a traditional karma in order to stay cool and I gazed at the dry season of this foreign landscape.  I prayed for peace, understanding and hope.  We are not called to be prosecutors or judges handing down sentences for inadequacies.  We are called to be witnesses.  That means that we are called to give first-hand accounts of how God works in our lives.  That we provide the narratives to God’s actions within our daily walk.  Does this mean that we are perfect and have all of the answers?  Of course not, this means that we are reaching out to others at the places where they are and sharing our stories, our narratives, our eye-witness testimony.

Posted in Raised by a village

Never Alone

Posted on by Janet

Two years ago,  while visiting my aunt and uncle,  I had the pleasure of sitting with my uncle and we watched YouTube videos of Il Divo.  I love men’s harmonic voices and this foursome won my heart.  

My uncle passed away a few months after that visit due to a massive heart attack.   His love of music and those  times we spent talking are memories I carry with me.   He gave me a glimpse of my late mother that I never knew by sharing stories from his childhood.  

Tonight,  my commute home was longer than normal due to heavy traffic.   Someone loaned a few CDs to me and one happened to be Il Divo.   She claimed Il Divorce to be an acquired taste and seemed surprised when I told her that I happen to love the quartet.   During the traffic jam, I heard the song You’ll Never Walk Alone.   Tears sprang to my eyes and I saw my uncle sitting at the computer saying,  “Listen to the words.   Do you know how true they are?”

Last night,  I spoke to a group of ladies about the Ubuntu Explorer Journeys with the United Methodist Women and our trip last year to the Philippines. Afterward,  I sat with few of the women and one of them asked, “weren’t you ever afraid?”   I replied,  “sure,  there were times of uncertainty. Oddly enough,  I was most afraid that they would leave me.”   She asked,  “What would you have done?   Seriously,  what would you have done?”   I said,  “They were never going to leave me.  We were never alone.”   In that moment, when I spoke those words, I believed that  I truly understood the truth:  God never leaves us and we are never alone.   Sometimes doubt,  fear and racing thoughts invade our psyche to the point of breaking.   And then,  like a candle in the darkness,  light fills the space and hope begins to grow. 

To my uncle,  thank you for the memory of a song of hope. 
~Janet