The Farm

Ok, I have been totally blogked (Amy's word) this week, so I am going to pull the old "Best of" like they do on the radio and let you in on some of my old stuff. This may be a little TMI, but it will give some insight into my youth. (Sorry for the length, but my self-indulgence is boundless)

MY HOME TOWN
I grew up in Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania, by normal standards a hick town, but since we had a college we were rocket scientists compared to the surrounding communities. We could have been the town used in the movie the ‘Outsiders’ because we had professor’s kids (the socs) and the townies (the greasers). I wasn’t a professor’s kid, but I was on the intelligent and athletic side, so I hung with the Socs.

The greatest example of how back woods my town was, is that we had the first day of deer season off, because too many people would be absent otherwise. What was really insane was that they would list who killed a deer during the announcements in the morning. “Nick Hoover shot a 6-point, Dale McCandless shot an 8-point and the big winner for today is Joe Potts who bagged his father while cleaning his gun.” Let’s just say if the gene pool were the ocean the majority of folks in my town would be washed up on the beach. (Insert ‘Dueling Banjo’ music here)

My father was a brilliant guy, but for some reason he needed to play farmer from 1979 - 1989, so we moved to the cultural Mecca of Slippery Rock. It was exciting when we first bought the farm (actually bought a farm, not became deceased). I was 8 and envisioned being Joe Farmer, up at the crack of dawn decked out in plaid and denim, feeding the cattle and fertilizing the crops. This “American Gothic” portrait lasted all of a week. I slept ‘till noon, was lucky to feed myself and the only fertilizing I did was through my mouth and my asshole.

My brother, where do I start, this kid was destined for daytime talk shows. I tortured the hell out of him and I’ll tell you why because: Boredom + Creativity = Torture. Remember this formula, as it is the catalyst for the majority of the stories on the following pages.

PIGS

The Auction:
In order to buy pigs we went to this town called New Wilmington for pig auctions, whenever the freezer was getting low on pork products. This was always an interesting experience because of those sharply dressed, party animals the Amish. Our Japanese model truck was always parked among a plethora of horse-drawn buggies.

I always wondered if they treated their buggies like our cars. Do you need a license to operate a buggy? If so, is there a learner’s permit as well? “OK Jebadiah you can use the buggy tonight, but remember you can’t be out after dark without a licensed buggy driver with you.” And where do you go to buy a buggy? Is there a Fast Eddie’s used buggy lot where you can get great deals on older models, hurry in before the ‘85’s are gone (the 1885’s that is). And where would Fast Eddie advertise? Mostly barn raisings and pig auctions I would assume. “Gentlemen put down that barn and gather ‘round, check out this beauty, 2 horse power and we have it in over 3 different shades of black. If you have a family, and we know you do, check out the station buggy. It seats six and we can add the lovely wood paneling on the side at no extra charge. Your price $70, it comes equipped with power brakes (reigns), windshield wipers (a rag), and seatbelts (a rope). This model is 4 horsepower for that extra umph in the mud and snow. It even comes with snow tires (horseshoes with small nails).”

Anyway, the Amish were always at the auctions, where 100-150 men would sit and bid on the pigs that were paraded into an arena type area. It seemed normal to us, I didn’t realize that not every family spent their Thursday evenings at the pig auctions. Hey, did you see ‘Cheers’ last night? Uh, no I saw a bunch of Amish buying pigs, does that count?

Once we purchased our pigs we went to the loading area and herded them into the back of the Toyota truck equipped with custom walls created by pa Crawford himself. The biggest treat for my brother and I is that we got to ride in the back with the pigs on the way home. (I guess the Amish just walked theirs home unless they had the El Camino buggy.) What 10 year old doesn’t dream of being bounced around in the back of a truck with pigs in 20 degree weather? This was in the early 80’s, before political correctness, when Pa Crawford could drink a Miller on the way home if he felt like it. When you fell asleep in your car after driving drunk and the cop just woke you up and said head on home.

Frozen Pigs:
On one of the auction trips, we purchased a group of young pigs and I was beaming with pride because I bought my first pig with $60 from my savings account. The idea was that when we sold the meat I would get $100 in return. Little did I know, but later that winter the heat lamp would burn out in the barn and the entire group of pigs would freeze to death. I learned a financial lesson that winter, a pig is only worth $100 if it lives long enough to get to the butcher. There are no refunds and no warrantees when it comes to livestock.

Financial lessons are one thing, but child labor is another. There it was in black and white on our daily list of chores; “Take pigs down over the hill and bury them”. And now for a quick math lesson...

What is the best way for two kids standing 4’ 7” and weighing 75 lbs to bury 5 pigs weighing in at 60 lbs each when they have to travel a ½ mile through 3 foot snow drifts?
A. Use a sled and drag them down over the hill?
B. Cut them into pieces and put them into bags.
C. Drag them a 100 feet from the barn and hide them in the snow.

If you said 'C' you are correct. A 100 feet in that snow and cold was like walking to China as far as we were concerned. It was all good until the spring thaw, follow your nose to the rotten pile of ham-n-bones. “I do not like green pigs and ham”.

The Rodeo:
In the event that the pigs lived long enough to put on weight, my brother and I would beg Pa Crawford to put on the pig rodeo. First we’d get the pig into a small feeding area, then we’d tie a rope around it’s waist. Next, I’d get on the pig, grab the rope and await the opening of the stall door. BANG! I’m off, left, right, I’m still on, then he makes a break for the tractor which is not high enough for both of us to clear, so I bail out into the hay. My brother and Pa Crawford would laugh hysterically, as I picked the straw and dirt out of my teeth. Pig – 1; Me – 0.

Pig by Day, Sausage by Night:
The slaughterhouse memories are as close to actual brutal violence as I got out on the farm.

WARNING: The following story contains disturbing images and tasty pork products.

The pig slaughtering pretty much went as follows: The pig would be led onto the main floor of the barn, like a gladiator entering the Coliseum. A small pail of feed placed in the center, lured the pig into place. Pa Crawford, with the smell of bacon in his nose and focused energy in his brow, would calmly walk up to the prey and place a 22 right between the eyes. POW! A few squeals, a couple kicks of the legs and then a quick slit of the throat and it was over.

A pulley system was in place to hoist the pig on the air by his Achilles tendon, to let the blood drain. A large barrel filled with scalding water was placed under the pig and then the pig would be lowered into it to ease the skinning process. Gutting the pig was the most vile portion because of the stench. “I love the smell of pig intestines in the morning, that noxious smell, smells like victory”. Once the pig is skinned and gutted, it’s off to the butcher for pork chops, sausage, ham and bacon. For some reason the testicles ended up the garage in formaldehyde. When you’re 10 years old your Dad’s testicles are huge compared to your chestnuts. Try comparing them to an adult pig, or the grapefruits on an adult bull. The inferiority complex begins at 10, future therapy is almost certain.


OTHER BARNYARD CREATURES

Dudley:
We had a variety of creatures over the years, pigs, goats, cows, horses, pony’s, rabbits, cats, dogs and also the other creatures that go along with a barn, snakes, rats, mice, birds etc… The star of the show was definitely our pony Dudley. He had to be the biggest bastard Pony on the face of the earth, he was the Hitler of the Pony world. Every time we tried to ride this obnoxious beast, he would run like a bat out of hell, stop on a dime, dip his head and send me into a routine that a Romanian gymnast would be proud of. Then as if that weren’t enough, he would run all over the neighborhood until we could coax him back to the barn, usually 10 12 hours later. It’s no wonder that I weighed 80 lbs at the age of 13, I was either chasing the horses, the cows, the pigs or my brother around for hours a everyday.

Trampled Under Hoof:
I can only remember being trampled twice down on the farm, the first was humorous, the second was dangerous. The first was by a colt that was just a few weeks old. We were all in the barn enjoying the beauty of life as a colt started to get her legs under her. Out of nowhere it bolted straight for me, I gave her a head fake, she didn’t bite, I faked left and jumped right, still coming at me. The next thing I remember was staring at the barn floor with an inch of dirt and crap in my throat, and a hoof print on the back of my neck. Again everyone found amusement at my misfortune.

The second trampling was a little scary, and came ironically enough from the colt’s mother, it must have run in their family. Pa Crawford and I found her around the back of the barn, on a night with no moon, so visibility was nil. I began to walk towards her in the blackness when BAM! I was knocked into the manure pile as the horse’s chest bowled me over, and her hoof and iron horseshoe landed beside my face. Pa Crawford picked me up, dusted me off and we got her back into the barn, but that hoof is something I can picture to this day.

Rabbits:
We also raised rabbits for a spell, which in all honesty really sucked. The phrase newlyweds are like rabbits is absolutely true. All they did was eat and have sex, kind of like Gene Simmons of Kiss. Rabbits look all cute and cuddly, until you try and pick one up and then it’s all claws and teeth. RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY! We did actually eat one of the rabbits during our time on the homestead. We had it over rice and it tasted like chicken, only a bit tougher.

Artificial Insemination:
The truck pulled up around 7:00 am, and a man dressed in a blue jump suit and boots climbed out and began fidgeting with the back of his pick-up truck. The dew was sleeping lazily on the untrodden grass and I made my way to the center of my world, the barn. I’m 11 years old wearing my thermals and shit-kickers. Pa Crawford is there waiting patiently as the man puts on an arm-length plastic glove and grabs a long thin needle-like apparatus full of frozen Black Angus semen and heads for the stall where our cow is oblivious to what’s about to happen.

I climb up onto the wall above the stall like a spectator at a football game, and Pa Crawford holds the cow steady below me. The man lifts the tail and instantly becomes the Fugitive. HELLO! Good morning Mrs. Cow, don’t mind me I’m just going to tickle your esophagus from the other end. I mean no foreplay at all, just Whoop there it is! Then off comes the glove, Pa Crawford pays the man and in a flash he’s gone.

As if this act isn’t strange enough, did you ever stop to think how they get the semen in the first place. I guess that’s where they get the term beef stroganoff (OK old joke, but it was appropriate here). After the man was gone, I climbed down from the rafters and went back to bed. Just another day for me in paradise.

Insemination Success!
Well about a year after the insemination, guess who was ready to become a Mom? That’s right, I guess the turkey bastor approach had achieved its goal. The only problem was that her due date was a weekday and Pa Crawford was at work, so I had to keep an eye on her out in the pasture. The plan was for me to cut the umbilical cord and rub iodine on both the mom and the new calf to prevent infection. OK, I’m like 12 years old and have no medical background to speak of, but apparently I’m qualified enough to birth a cow by myself.

My brother was missing in action, so I’m sitting in a field picking clover and avoiding cow shit while holding a rag and a small bottle of iodine. All of a sudden we have action, the Mom begins mooing and lays down about 25 feet from me. The calf begins to emerge from her nether regions, and I decide that it’s time I spring into action, so I start walking over to her. To my surprise she gets up with part of the calf hanging out of her and starts to walk away. Picture this: a 12 year old boy in raggedy farm clothes holding a bottle of iodine and following a cow with half a calf out of her, somehow Norman Rockwell forgot to paint this moment of Americana.

Thankfully, the mother lies down again, and I go over and slightly tug on the calf and presto I’m a successful obstetrician. I check the airways, cut the cord, rub on the iodine and the procedure is done.

The Tooth Fairy and Dog Teeth
I’m 10 years old and a friend of mine and I find this dog skull in the woods, being a capitalist I immediately think, damn there’s a fortune in teeth there. The Tooth Fairy gives me $.25 a tooth, there must be 50 teeth here, that like almost $5. (I know it’s more than that now, but at the time I was 10 give me a break I hated math.) After using a stick to get the teeth out of the rotten dog skull we split the pile up and put the teeth in our pockets.

Once I get home I put my share into a baggie, sneak them into my room and prepare for the fortune that is surely coming my way. I figure why make the Tooth Fairy do extra work, so I put all of the teeth under my pillow, and drift off to sleep feeling like I just hit the lotto. I wake up in the morning expecting cash and instead there they are just the damn teeth. OK, maybe she didn’t have enough cash on her, so I’ll try it again the next night. Same plan, same result. I guess that the Tooth Fairy only comes for human teeth, what a gip! Naivete - 1; Me – 0


THE BARN

Electric Fences:
Electric fences are a great idea for livestock, not so great for kids. It’s difficult to put into the words the feeling you get the first time you touch an live wire. It’s probably the equivalent of being sacked by Lawrence Taylor. You get knocked on your ass and you don’t really remember how you got there. On the farm we constantly came across the electric fences and had to figure out if they were on or not. Mr. High pain tolerance, Pa Crawford did a lot of the testing by holding our hands and then grabbing the fence so we could experience the joy of a second hand shock. There’s nothing like a little shock therapy to get the juices flowing on a blustery morning in December.

Then there’s always the trust factor, I’d run into the barn to turn off the fence, my brother would yell “is it off?”, of course I said yes even though it wasn’t and the next thing I’d hear is “AHHHHH You Dickhead!” Of all the shocks my brother sustained definitely there was one that stands out in my mind. It was a Sunday morning and he wandered into the house looking like Jack Nicholson at the end of “One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest”. Apparently the boy wonder was standing on wet grass feeding the cows when he made contact with the fence. He actually had a black spot on his hand and foot where the electricity entered and exited his body. For days after the shock the lights would just go on whenever he got near them.

Radiation and The Power:
Probably from all of the electric fence experiences my brother developed a great fear of radiation. When we got our first remote control, I would point it at him saying “Radiation gonna get you”, he would scream and run into his room. Evidently, he had heard somewhere that radiation from a clicker would deform him in some way. Talk about the greatest power an older brother could have. Anytime he would annoy me I would just point and shoot. Then we got a microwave and I didn’t see my brother for a month.

Finally, Pa Crawford explained that the remote couldn’t hurt him and that was the end of my reign of terror. After months of fighting over the remote, some ground rules were established. Whomever had control of the remote, which we called “The Power”, had control of what we watched on TV. The only stipulation was that we couldn’t take the remote by force, but if we could get it some other way we then had the power. Being the poor sport that I was, whenever we watched crap like ‘Lassie’ or ‘Dennis the Menace’, I would just laugh as hard as I could whenever the canned laughter came in, until he changed the channel or gave up. (A tactic I sometimes still use with the wife today) Other tricks were removing the remote batteries or blocking the infra-red sensor on the cable box. However, neither of those tactics were as effective as the annoying laugh.

Hayforts:
My brother and I always had a lot of free time because our Dad was a single parent who worked everyday. Especially in the summers we were basically left to our own devices for most of the day. This led to a lot of boredom, so we started building hay forts in the loft of the barn. We created secret rooms and passages by re-arranging the bales of hay. There’s nothing finer than being covered in hay on a 90 degree day in the middle of July. If you thought that grass was itchy after exercise, try getting sweaty in the hay loft. We’d climb out of the loft looking like the scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz. These forts were very instrumental in one of our favorite games “War the Home Game”.


War the Home Game:
There were several opportunities for my brother and I to meet our maker, some of which we’ve discussed. We had this game that we played with some of the neighbor kids, that was basically an early version of “American Gladiators”. We would take turns choosing from a stock pile of weapons like tent poles, garbage can lids, helmets and every kind of ball imaginable. The game was limited to the inside of the barn and it was basically a fight to the death.

This wasn’t so dangerous or out of the ordinary for kids, but we had rope swings with buckets tied to the end and these were attached to the 15 foot rafters, which we’d often run across as well. On a few occasions the ropes would break and we’d fall inches from a tractor or a spike. Then there was always the chance that the tent pole would make you an instant shish-kabob. The game itself was great fun, other than swinging through the air at 20 miles and hour and getting plugged in the face with a tennis ball thrown by Tarzan up in the rafters. Or the high you get from tetanus as you grab one of the many loose nails frantically climbing the barn walls. Another great feeling is getting a sliver of hay jammed under your fingernails. Good times.


Lawn Care:
Every other week we had to mow the lawn, which is pretty normal except that it took 4 hours to mow ours. That is the equivalent of driving 240 miles in a car. Plus, we had the slowest riding lawnmower ever. What sucked was that while my brother did his half of the lawn I had no one to bully, but I soon solved this problem. (Boredom + Creativity = Torture). It started out innocent enough, I’d kick soccer balls at him as he rode in circles, 2 points for the mower, 5 points for my brother, 10 points if I got him in the head, and 25 points if I knocked him off the mower. This was entertaining for about 10 minutes and then I’d miss and have to chase the ball.

So I went in search of something, shall we say a little more challenging, Nerf football - nah, tennis balls – nah, oh here we go my brothers arrow and my dads steel tipped arrows. I would sit on the porch with a glass of lemonade and a quiver full of arrows. Then as my brother would come into view, I would launch one to the stars and when it was just a speck in the sky it would come crashing down usually within a few feet of my brother and the mower. After he realized what was going on he would just abandon the mower and run like hell as the arrow began it’s descent. The mower would crash into the barn, and the arrow would land near my brother as he ran, doing zig-zags as if he could outsmart it. One afternoon I was having an off day, in other words I was missing so much he wasn’t even getting off of the mower. So to scare him I launched one just over his head, then it dawned on me that if I was less of a marksman I could have killed him. That was the day that I retired the game.

The Great Fires of ’84 and ’85:
Down on the farm we gave a third of our trash to the pigs, a third went on the curb and the rest we burned. The summer of ’84 had been a particularly hot and dry one, and on that fateful windy day I set the trash on fire and returned to my place in front of the television. Ten minutes later I hear my brother yell FIRE!. We ran outside and began beating the flames with towels, the smoke was in our eyes and we were frantically trying to put it out. Finally, I yelled to my brother to call the fire department, as the flames got closer to the house. The fire engines roared and the lights flashed as they pulled into our driveway, and ten men and women began dousing the flames. After about 30 minutes the fire was out and the house was saved.

A year later almost to the day, we experienced the second great fire at the old homestead. Same deal, burning the trash on a windy day and bam the fire was on again. This time the corral was on fire, so again I yelled fro my brother to call for the fire department. After all was said and done the fire chief said to me “Wasn’t I out here last year?”, I said yes and thanked him. The best thing to come out of the great fires of ’84 and ’85 was that it only took two hours to mow the lawn that year.


SPORTS

Golf Down on the Farm
Every summer my brother and I would set up a three-hole golf course around the farm. We mowed the grass short in various patterns to create a green, then we dug a hole and jammed a cup into it, finally we marked the hole with a soccer corner flag and Bingo! Instant golf course. This lasted about 4 years and then my brother hit a 90 degree slice through Pa Crawford’s bedroom window, FORE!

Sine the three-hole course was out we decided to start driving balls from the roof of the barn, natural progression don’t you think? I would climb up onto the 30 foot roof and along the top was a rounded piece of aluminum, that you could easily dent to form a tee. So I’m 30 feet off of the ground with a driver that is as long as I am tall driving golf balls into the pasture. After a few buckets the game started getting slow, so (Boredom + Creativity = Torture) I told my brother to get his baseball glove and stand about 150 yards into the pasture. Now we have a game, I would drive golf balls and he would try and catch these tiny hard orbs traveling at ungodly speeds. This lasted until I drove one about a foot above his head and realized he could have been seriously hurt, and we retired that game. (I sense a pattern here.)

With that game being over, we started a new one involving a school bus. The elementary school bus would come by about an hour after we were dropped off, so I would usually be on the barn roof waiting to drive one at the bus, and/or the little kids that would get off of it. Imagine little Joey getting off the bus after a long day of recess, lunch and the 3 R’s and whiz, a golf ball flies by his head. You had to keep your head on a swivel at the old Crawford house.

Olympic Mail Fetching
One summer a nest of bees decided to make our mailbox their new home. We discovered this after Jason came running and screaming towards the front porch one afternoon carrying the mail and swatting around his head. Three bee stings and some baking soda later and the man of steel was back on his feet, at least for now. Instead of doing the smart thing and smoking them out and destroying the nest we made a game out of it. The idea was to successfully retrieve the mail without getting stung. This event took hours to complete, and it went something like this:

Next up in the mail fetching competition is Jason Crawford. He spies the nest and approaches cautiously. He’s ready, there he goes running past the mail box, yanking it open and continuing down the road for fifty yards. (Meanwhile I’m on the porch laughing my ass off) Now for his second approach he runs by tries to grab the mail, but he misses and runs off into the distance. Finally, his third attempt he moves in slowly, slowly, and then with the speed of a bullfrog's tongue, he grabs the mail and sprints for the porch. He has escaped unscathed, but the mailbox door is still open. To achieve a score from the judges he must close the door to complete the fetch. His technique is sloppy as he runs and slams the door, bad move. Three stings and some baking soda later our hero is ready to fetch another day.

Pa Crawford finally noticed the baking soda and Jason tells him about the bees and the mail fetching Olympics are over when Pa Crawford burns the nest.

fin