Ready to Eat!

Yes it is harvest time on the prairies !

 These are the times when lights traveling across the field in long angled trails, sometimes twirling, sometimes seeming to magically   multiply as combines, tractors, and trucks join together only to part again and continue on to  travel on imaginary highways avoiding sloughs and rocks, while  momentarily disappearing behind softly rising hills and dips on the prairie landscape.

These are the days when tomato sandwiches and mayonnaise taste the best.  Purple plums eaten with hands that have handled the hose of diesel fuel, messed with greasy pulleys,  and  probably swept out at least one mouse nest  from the grain truck have a flavour and savouriness not found anywhere else on the planet. 

Yes, harvest meals are truly a unique experience and  are  almost  a welcome challenge to the meal makers as they prepare, pack, and transport meals to the harvest field.  Pots full of mashed potatoes, roasters of fried chicken, casseroles of hot buttered corn, along with a fresh pie or two are only a small example of the nutritious fare travelled out to the back forty; packed in newspapers in cardboard boxes, along with 'real' dishes and metal utensils...all in accordance with  that  heretofore little known by urbanites harvest meal law  that  somewhere on some grain box is sketched out in a combination of axle grease and barely dust:

  Items such as cold Cheese Whiz sandwiches on white bread, canned fruit, and bags of potato chips are NEVER EVER to be disguised as a meal for a Harvesting Prairie Farmer.

 Alas,there was once a time when I, as a mother of two preschoolers, married to a then farmer who was 'out combining in his field'  mistakenly and yes ,  brazenly, thought that this above previously unproven agriculturally based law could be broken.

I thought of this because I was tired, busy, and wanted to cut corners...soooooo...I went to the nearby rural general store and purchased some bottles of Coke, a bag of Doritos,  a few chocolate bars, and some garlic sausage and proceeded to travel fifteen miles out to the field, with the children strapped in their seats, over gravel and dirt  roads  until I finally reached the approach closest to where the combine and  more importantly my combiner was busily traveling around and around on the field.

  I remember distinctly that it was an almost festive time.  The children played in the dusty stubble as my husband sat in the car eating Doritos and hunks of sausage listening to the sound of grasshoppers and children laughing. All too soon it was time to pack up paper and wrappers when alas, alas, alas, as I picked up the plastic label that had once protected the garlic sausage I saw these words:

This is a RAW meat product.  Do not consume until it is fully cooked.

The  truth of  the Harvest Law of  the Meal had made itself evident.

For the last 30 years I have always always checked for this sign whenever I purchase over the counter meat products.

Travels

It was a lovely trip.  Blue skies. The gold of harvested fields.  Balmy breeze.  Pleasant company.  Lots of interesting sites to visit and learn about.

My  fall 'holiday' included many observations about life and lifestyle choices giving one pause to wonder  just 'What is with that?' on more than one occasion.

For instance , the presence of a television  at the side of a rural highway.  It was difficult to determine if it was flat screened or not  due to the speed of our passing, but it did have an intact chassis and the rabbit ears were not evident.

After a day of perusing art galleries, tourist attractions, and guided tours of museums and cathedrals,  the most unusual item seen on that sunny cloudless day was an upright  14 ' aluminum boat situated in a grassy ditch, minus both trailer or owner; not to mention the total absence of water or fish. 

The following day while continuing on our travels we were treated to another 'what is with that?' type moment as we noticed the frame of a gas  Bar B Q on a roadside approach, fifteen or so miles from the nearest farm/ranch or town. 

The who? what? why? of these objects will never be known; but if one was to dwell in the metaphysical meaning of such a sightings, perhaps one would note that the television was perhaps doing the watching of the public instead of the other way around. Hopefully it might have found the continuous , monotonous and relentless repetition of the 'reality' programming it would have been exposed to as vehicles passed, and passed, and continued to pass in a boring, repetitious, unchanging litany of sameness  not unlike that which  the drivers of those same vehicles have to endure as they sit and watch what passes as action and intelligence on televisions around the world.

I could guess that the boat in the dry ditch might be a symbol of the hopelessness of weather variances on the prairies or simply a sign of a fisherman's frustration after a particularly disappointing foray into a freakishly frustrating fishing fiasco.

For sure the presence of a Bar B Q on the open  rural and treeless approach could be a sign of society's comment on omnivores and their eating habits. But I doubt it.  It probably was more a sign of a broken tail gate after a Rider's Game--win or lose.

Yes,  the sighting of all of the above can be stretched to fit some sort of weak metaphysical metaphor to describe the state of the world, but my last encounter with the culture that our society encircles is much more easier to understand.

It happened while waiting to transfer my baggage from one bus to anther on the last leg of my journey home.  A woman came up to me and asked if I smoked.  I replied in the negative.  She then handed me her Bic lighter and asked if I could light her cigarette for her.  I looked at the cigarette she held to her mouth and said, " It is already lit."   She repeated again , " Light my cigarette, please."  I repeated, "It is already lit."  She looked down at the glowing cigarette and simply said, "Oh". She took her lighter from my hand and wandered away.

Nope, there is not a metaphysical meaning behind this strange encounter.  There  is, to my mind at least, an interesting 'Sheldon like'  physical law behind it in  the fact  that there were two things  already 'lit'--- even if only one was actually smoking. 


                                     ---Bazinga!

 

Harvest #1

What a joyous  end of August Monday.  Blue blue skies. Warm sun. The sound of the voices of numerous types of flocking birds coming through the open windows. Golden Rods blooming and crops in various stages of turning from green, to lime, to beige, to yellow and ultimately to gold. The hint of chill in the mild breeze in spite of  the warm temperature serves as a reminder to treasurer these beautiful moments in this season of transition.

This is truly my favourite time of year.  I am not sure quite why this is so. Perhaps it is because for so many years autumn meant the excitement of harvest .

Harvest. 

The time when Everyone counted on the farm. Everyone had a job.  Everyone was focused on the same goal.  Everyone was on the same team.  

 If you were part of the younger set ( 12 and under)  you were probably employed as  an official 'gopher'--go for the hammer, go for the water jug, go for the grease gun, go for the oil can,  and if your legs are long enough, go for the half ton.

Women  not only kept the house  organized, garden weeded , laundry done  and cared for children during this weather dictated season; but they also served as fuel organizers, auger haulers, parts repair retrievers;  and sometimes some became combine operators, grain haulers, and swather operators.   This was the only time in rural Canada when male and female roles seem to merge--although it was the rare male that harvested AND organized the Meal in the Field.

 The Meal in the Field was a culinary art form that goes back as far as the beginning of agriculture itself.  The Ploughman's Lunch could perhaps be considered  the first Meal in the Field.  Some  of the more energetic  Meal makers would pack hot saucepans full of new potatoes, with pork chops or hamburgers in foil, along with another pot full of fresh  vegetables gleaned from the garden.  Dishes and pots were packed in cardboard boxes and newspapers for insulation , along with condiments and fresh bread/buns.  I have even heard of ice cream in coolers to compliment the warm apple pie or rhubarb crisp.   All this would be loaded into the backseat  and trunk of the car, along with kids and dogs , and driven across and around fields (avoiding the swaths and potential oil pan damaging rocks) to the waiting stomachs of harvesters who perhaps hadn't seen the inside of a building for eight hours or more.

 There is nothing quite like the smell of barely dust and hot potatoes, along with combine grease, complimented by the sound of the burring of grasshoppers to complete the portrait of dusty truck drivers and even dustier (pre cabs and air conditioning) combine operators sitting in the  stubble with coffee thermos close at hand as they partake of perhaps their only  hot meal since dawn and perhaps their last, if the wind stays up and the straw stays dry, until dawn returns the next morning.

I am not sure if those days really still exist.  I somehow doubt it as machinery is bigger, people work off the farm so much more,  convenience foods abound; along with the likelihood that the actual owner of the field is doing the harvesting is lower now as people often opt for custom combiners to do the harvest work.

I loved those days and love the memory of them.  I guess running around barefoot in the stubble with a piece of chocolate cake in hand is not something one forgets easily.

What to Wear...What to Where?

For most of my 'womanly' years, I have hated the pressure of having to look right, dress up, or get jazzed up for any special event.  The reason for this may be the not so evident inner desire  to not be noticed, or it may be the more evident desire not to have to pay for someone else's standard of what the term appropriately dressed means.

I went to university during the early 1970's, which in Canada was actually the tail  end of the revolutionary 1960's in the rest of the world.  As the histrionic student  unrest hit Canadian campuses, the fashion of looking like one who came off of some boat carrying immigrants from Central Europe in the 1930s was  preferred if you didn't want pamphlets  in your face and 'would be' Trotskyites following you around.   Therefore, being  Forever in Blue Jeans , and blue jeans with a tee shirt worn with or without a bra (male or female)  were accepted and expected campus fashion  statements. 

I worked as a professional during the later 1970's and the worst part of my job was finding clothes that FIT!  I was neither over nor under weight,  nor exceptionally tall or short, but I was not built for the styles available to most of the other young women my age. There was something about being raised on meat and potatoes and working on the farm , along with the combined genetics of not so little grandmothers , that did something to my body that made my shoulders too wide,  my legs too short,  my feet too big, and my waist non existent  to be able to easily buy youthful looking clothes right off the rack.  I remember once, after  finally finding a style of dress slacks that fit properly, buying four pair,  one of every colour, for cash.

Then along came marriage, motherhood, maternity and mayhem.  With marriage  and motherhood there came the need to economise  on fashion, which wasn't all  that difficult  as I never really left the role nor the house for about 8 years.  Who cared how the Mama looked as long as she was clean and covered?  A wise friend once told me that it would have been more inappropriate if the children were poorly dressed and the mother the fashion plate. 

 At least every couple of years in the 1980's my wardrobe did change as the maternity clothes were brought out for six month spells at a time.  Haute Couture had nothing on me for seasonal adjustments to proper attire.


  My standard of having enough clothes in those days was primarily having one pair of black slacks that weren't either  too tight or too loose,  were clean (not necessarily ironed), and had the hem at the cuff at least duct taped up; along with a blouse that did not gape when the buttons were done ;  and a pair of dress shoes that if when you wore them with socks no one would notice. Those knee high nylons just did not last long enough nor were they warm enough to  justify buying them on a regular basis.  This outfit would be considered my 'going to town, church, and  out to supper ' attire and served me well well into the early 2000's.

Yes, there were some fashion faux pas' no doubt.  I do remember wearing rubber boots to the city with knee high blue jean culottes.  I wore a Mickey Mouse over sized tee shirt over my bathing suit for years at the lake; which other than the age inappropriate graphics, was probably considered a wise and welcome choice by many.   The once in every one's life memory of wearing something inside out to church , school, and/or town occurred  in every venue mentioned during those frantic years where the goal of  merely arriving was considered  the  achievement.

In a small town in rural Canada high fashion on a daily basis is not really expected or required in most businesses .   Grocery store clerks usually have a type of uniform, clerks in hardware stores gas stations,  and restauranteurs often wear aprons or coveralls.*  The only place in town that one might  encounter someone actually dressed up as an employee is the Bank ,  and that is the first place I headed upon my arrival in town that fateful fashion faux pas day.


  I remember going through the glass doors of this monetary home  of the fashion savvy and efficiently manicured bank clerks and suddenly--- I was LIMPING.  Not just a bit -- but quite a bit. 

 Was I suffering a stroke?
 Had I tripped? 
 Was someone playing a cruel joke on me?

No. None of the above.

 I looked down at my legs and feet  and  with terror I realized that ...



                  ..... I was wearing two different shoes.



To be fair they were of the same colour and ilk--both slip on type. No, I had not laced one up and ignored the other.  They were both outdoor shoes. They were not slippers--neither ballet nor bedroom.



  *I should clarify -- waitresses in small town cafes do NOT wear coveralls--well,  not often and not well and often not  willingly.