Resiliency

Resiliency:
1: The ability of a body to regain its original size and shape after being compressed, bent or stretched.
2: An ability to recover from or adjust easily to change or misfortune.

Farmers are some of the most resilient people I know.  Over the years we have been witness to or made aware of serious situations that have happened to farmers that may have compressed, bent or stretched them.  Whether it was their wallet, their heart, their physical endurance or their faith, they somehow seem to recover, although I would never call it easy.  For some reason farmers have an ability to see a very small light through a very narrow tunnel.

We know of farmers who have had barns burn, crops fail and cattle drop dead in the parlor after eating a rare poisonous plant.  We've watched droughts and floods age farmers well beyond their years.  We've had neighbors lose family members or employees in farm accidents. We've lost friends ourselves.

Many people have said to us "I don't know how you do it".  We don't really understand this, because we're not sure how not to do it.  How many people do you know that stay in the same career for their entire lifetime?  Are you still working in the same field that you were in after college? I am. Literally.

I'm not sure what keeps these farmers going sometimes. Whether its the next milking, only 12 hours away, or the next calving, only a couple months away, the next crop....maybe we just don't have enough time to even consider quitting.  I mean, you just can't stop milking the cows.  You wouldn't leave that standing crop in the field.  Somehow we are called to a level of responsibility that is above and beyond and involves things that just keep growing.

Last week there was a horrible freak snow storm in the Dakotas.  Tens of thousands of cattle were lost in the storm.  The storm came in much worse than predicted, and the cattle were caught off guard far from home.  The West does not operate the same as the East.  Ranches are gigantic in size with herd numbers sometimes in the thousands.  It takes days to move cattle from pasture to pasture, not mere hours.  The storm was surprising to so many people, but was is not surprising is the reaction, both positive and negative.  The comments made on some of the articles, obviously by non-ranchers, are offensive. The actions taken by other ranchers and those in the agricultural community are more than heart warming.  Here's a great blog post in response to some of those questions people were asking. When you have the time, it would be worth it to read it.

Questioning Cattle Deaths in South Dakota

News article with pictures:
Rapid City Journal

If you want to help (or be encouraged by people who are):
https://www.facebook.com/pledgeheifer

God gave me this verse today:
Isaiah 40:28
Have you never heard?

Have you never understood?

The Lord is the everlasting God,

the Creator of all the earth.

He never grows weak or weary.

No one can measure the depths of his understanding.

29He gives power to the weak

and strength to the powerless.

30Even youths will become weak and tired,

and young men will fall in exhaustion.

31But those who trust in the Lord will find new strength.

They will soar high on wings like eagles.

They will run and not grow weary.

They will walk and not faint.

 

But those who trust in the Lord will find new strength.  They will soar high on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not faint.