xmas letter 08

Farm life ’08
Dear friends, family and collection agencies:

This time last year we were VERY pregnant. Hattie (now 10 months old ) was cookin’ up in a pot and only needed some additional Christmas cookies and the entire month of January to be done. The doula (whom we nicknamed Paula Abdoula behind her back) was one cool customer—a sturdy Irish woman with 25 years of doulage(?) under her belt. Her sagacious prebirth advice, tendered one night at birthing class was, “pack yourself a snack for the birth, dads! Don’t forget that you are in there too and need to take care of and treat yourself.” I took a quick shine to this Mary O’Riley lady!
On hearing this important command, I immediately went out and bought a container of Cheddar Goldfish out of deference to her vast experience. The goldfish ,however, didn’t make it to the exit of the Stop and Shop. That was two months before Hattie was actually born yet, curiously, it happened repeatedly each and every time I tried to think ahead to the burdens of being next to someone actually giving birth and get myself a replacement snack. Finally, I gave up thinking about myself. Mary’s advice for mom? When labor starts, drink a beer. Serious. Now Cori really liked this lady too!
Labor started Feb 13. The nurse called the farm and asked where Cori was. “She’s mucking stalls,” I admitted. “I can’t stop her.” I couldn’t lie. It was true. “She’s of German descent,” I offered meekly. “It’s what they do.”
Wishing to avoid a scene similar to that in Monty Python where the overworked farm woman gives birth while sweeping a dirt floor and doesn’t even know it until she looks down, we headed to the hospital. Cori took the doula’s advice to heart and popped a beer for the 30 minute (now extremely and regularly painful) drive out of The Honky (errr, what we call Kerhonkson behind its back). There was only one ‘position of comfort’ for Cori in that pickup truck and that was facing backwards, cold Budweiser in hand, no seatbelt (I know this sounds like a line from a country song…). We were a sight. Dee Lite’s ‘Groove is in the Heart’ pumping on the stereo, Cori telling me to step on it, me trying to not hit any deer on the way and unsuccessfully looking for a last minute snack shop (but alas, to no avail).
We pulled into the hospital parking lot after a stop to the doctor, then Home Depot and then a brief stop to check out our friend Kate’s new kitchen remodel (just kidding), opened the passenger door and an empty beer bottle rolled out onto the birthing center’s parking lot!
Nice.
So much for first impressions…
“Don’t prejudge us!” I yelled to the horrified nurses and their security cameras. I seriously thought we were going to get arrested for endangering a minor before we even officially had one. “What??? Mary said it was ok,” I scolded them back.
Hattie was born on Feb 14th (without a single snack!) and has stolen our hearts every day since. She’s been the lead story of ’08. I do not mean to downplay the actual birth- Cori was a champ and in serious pain. We’ll focus instead, at her request, on the glorious aftermath!
Life on the farm has changed in the expected ways with a baby- which is to say, not that much for the decently prepared farmers. There’s been the scheduling particulars, naps, feeding and exploring. She a curious little kid and she laughs all the time--except when she’s crying . (Or sleeping or just babbling). She’s recently taken to putting the back of her fist against her open mouth and making a whooping Indian sound in public, which she learned in utero, I think, from her mother on that hurried Feb 14th trip to birthing center. She whoops it up in public with such gusto and cause that we are forced to choke back our own guffaws. Her first words were (and I’m very proud of this because we’ve been practicing the phrase for some time now), “No dad, I want mom to change my diaper at 3am.”
Ok, I’ll stop that annoying parental gush that OTHER people do! I know you’d rather eat cooked carrots and mop your floor than hear about how cute our baby’s actions are!
The horses are intrigued with this little bundle that one of us carries around. Hattie’s favorite is Taz- an oafish young pony (think teenage boy in human years) who allows her to scratch his muzzle. It’s very cute but makes me think it’s never too early to start working on the “Application To Date My Daughter” which requires 18 years for processing…
Cori’s lesson business has grown in a nicely managed way with some fun clients who are learning a lot and growing under her careful care. The kids love her, too. We’ve been able to avail ourselves of a few working students—kids work around the farm and in exchange get riding lessons. As part of the deal, they tip us off to the cool new slang like (“like OMG that is mad OD!) ( ‘like’ : superfluous waste of breath and/or ink). ‘OMG’ (expletive) abbreviation meaning ‘Shit’ by way of ‘Oh My God!’ ‘mad’ (adverb, incredibly) meaning ‘incredibly.’ Typically used to qualify any word anywhere. Origins, young white kids trying to sound more ‘gangsta-bitch.’ Application is extremely unenforced. Note: has nothing to do with anger. OD –(Adj) ‘incredible’. Archaic -From ye olde American slang, circa 1990, ‘Overdose’ --typically referring to an enjoyable excess of something that shouldn’t be enjoyed to excess.) In short, we can’t really understand a word these kids today say…making us, well, parents.
This year we started haying our neighbor’s fields, taking me back to the Katonah farm days of using rusty old fickle machinery, some of which I actually salvaged from the family farm. The manuals got lost somewhere unfortunately. It took some creative problem solving and more than a few well placed whacks with a hammer but that equipment became compliant (damn it) and we got a lot of hay up (the preferred dangling preposition in the farm biz around these parts).
We had on average 17 horses this year. That’s a lot of hay, as they say on Wallstreet. That’s also a lot of crap, as they say on Wallstreet.
Despite the stern family warnings to the contrary, we’re going back to Florida this winter with the horses. Only this time we’re driving a 38’ RV down there, which means if, like last time, we are chased by a killer tornado, at least we can try to drive away, versus having to grab our underwear and run across a field in the dark for our lives. Some of you are rolling your eyes, I know. (“Wait, they’re going BACK?!??!) The resort (ok not actually a resort, per se, but neither is it a trailer park as my sisters insist) has slipped a line into the contract this year, we noticed. In a long delineation of do’s and don’ts, they have now insisted that people (read: Wally) wear shirts at all times when on the property. This, I assure you, has never been a concern of management before we showed up 2 years ago and classed up the joint.
The bichons are coming. Because many have cautiously and politely asked how they are doing playing second fiddle to Hattie, I’ll answer honestly. They dig her. They have been very respectful of her space and now that she’s eating food, they have been loyally standing guard, like a Presidential security detail I’m guessing, waiting for the mush she either drops or projectile pukes on the floor. It’s hard to tell if they are being protective or whether they are considering her to be the ultimate squeaky toy with special General Tsao’s flavored diaper. That window is closing because she is now bigger than they are and she can crawl as fast as they move. She can run them down with her white, plastic, wheelie, flying-saucer-car thingy, which bears more than a passing resemblance to our downstairs guest toilet, but with wheels and a seatbelt (hmmm, there might be invention in there somewhere…).
Our friend Cal Patch will be watching the farm, right after she watches the popular Netflix films “So you’ve suckered into leaving Brooklyn and farm-sitting for 3 months in a house with no heat, now what??” (rated pg) and “The bridal goes on the other end of the horse, and other useful horsemanship tips to avoid lawsuits.” (Actually, Cal knows what’s she’s doing).
Happy to say that siblings and parents are all well on both sides. We’ve had many nice overlaps with grandparents PU Helga and Heidi, great grandma Nichols, cousins and uncles , aunts Blair, Sandy and Hopie. Nephews and nieces are growing likes weeds, stepping past us to fawn over Hattie. That the oldest, Levi, is now a teenager still leaves me scratching my head wondering where the time went. I’ve given him my private line in case he gets in trouble…
My ‘Dear Wally’ advice column in the local paper continues to greatly amuse at least one reader, me. I actually received one piece of hate mail that came over unibomber style from some twisted fruitcake- a single-spaced manifesto of boiling-over contempt, contesting my liberal political leanings and tearing down my character point by point. Well, I fought my primal, vengeful (Scorpio?) urge to ‘shock and awe’ him back with a good written scorching and instead defused the situation the mature way--with a polite request to not take anything I write too seriously, because I myself don’t. That seemed to do the trick and we’re now great friends. (ok not exactly great friends but at least I don’t have to grope under my car seat for a pipe bomb every time I get in).
We still have the boat (many continue to wonder). It is rented out as we try to convince someone that, au contraire, this economy is the PERFECT time to acquire an outdated gas slurping luxury item. And ‘luxury’ it will be with just a can or two of Pledge and some elbow grease! (or a paid up insurance policy and a shoulder-held rocket launcher.)
This year I’ve been doing a lot of work for NPR in the form of interviews. This includes everyone from saw mill workers to crop dusters to the head New Yorker cartoonist. As it’s carried on radio stations across the country, if you hear the authorial tagline, scratch your head and wonder, yes it is me.
So that’s about it friends, family and collection agencies. If you are in the first two groups and want to drop us a line, or visit us in Florida near Orlando, you know where to find us. If you are in the last group, apparently you already know where to find us!
Happy ’09- Love, Cori, Wally, Hattie, Dr Funk, Diesel and the RV that gets 5 miles to the gallon. Gulp. So much for that carbon footprint!! Look , the more gas we use, the quicker it will be gone and the quicker we’ll have to all be green. So we’re doing our part!