Farming

I grew up on a first-generation dairy farm, and some days, I hated it. I hated that sometimes the cows got out, and I was late to school because we had to put them away. I hated the jokes that kids made about me smelling like manure or wearing boots that actually had mud on them. I didn’t always want to spend my evenings in the barn, feeding calves or helping milk.

My parents were often too busy to go to all of my games and events. We rarely went on vacation. I didn’t understand why people would tell me that growing up on a farm was a blessing. I hated waiting for chores to be done before opening presents at Christmas time and that we had to leave family events early to do chores. I didn’t understand why my friends always wanted to see the cows when they came over instead of hanging out in the house. Overall, I wasn’t always proud to be a farm kid.

Looking back, getting to grow up as a farm kid was one of the best things that my parents did for me. I loved being able to have animals like horses, donkeys, sheep, alpacas, and goats along with our cows, and I loved naming the baby calves and watching them grow up. I just didn’t understand that even all the things that I didn’t like about growing up on a farm at the time would both help me later in life, and those would be the things that I miss the most when I’m away.