SO GOD MADE A FARMER
And on the 8th day, God looked down
on his planned paradise and said, "I
need a caretaker." So God made a farmer.
God said, "I need somebody willing to
get up before dawn, milk cows, work all
day in the fields, milk cows again, eat
supper and then go to town and stay
past midnight at a meeting of the school board." So God made a farmer.
"I need somebody with arms strong
enough to rustle a calf and yet gentle
enough to deliver his own grandchild.
Somebody to call hogs, tame cantankerous machinery, come home hungry, have to wait for lunch until his wife's done feeding visiting ladies and tell the ladies to be sure and come back real soon - and mean it." So God made a farmer.
God said, "I need somebody willing to
sit up all night with a newborn colt. And
watch it die. Then dry his eyes and say,
'Maybe next year.' I need somebody who can shape an axe handle from a persimmon sprout, shoe a horse with a hunk of car tyre, who can make harnesses out of haywire, feed sacks and shoe scraps.
And who, planting time and harvest season, will finish his forty-hour week by Tuesday noon, then, pain'n from 'tractor back,' put in another seventy-two hours." So God made a farmer.
God had to have somebody willing to
ride the ruts at double speed to get the
hay in ahead of the rain clouds and yet
stop in mid-field and race to help when
he sees the first smoke from a neighbour’s place. So God made a farmer.
God said, "I need somebody strong
enough to clear trees and heave bails,
yet gentle enough to tame lambs and
wean pigs and tend the pink-combed
pullets, who will stop his mower for
an hour to splint the broken leg of a
meadow lark. It had to be somebody
who'd plow deep and straight and not
cut corners.
Somebody to seed, weed, feed, breed
and rake and disc and plow and plant
and tie the fleece and strain the milk
and replenish the self-feeder and finish
a hard week's work with a five-mile
drive to church.
"Somebody who'd bale a family together with the soft strong bonds of sharing, who would laugh and then sigh, and then reply, with smiling eyes, when his son says he wants to spend his life 'doing what dad does.'" So God made a farmer.
Harvey, P. (1978, October). So God Made a Farmer.
Speech presented at the Future Farmers of America
Convention, Louisville, Kentucky..