December 2021 – Living de Good Life

Viewpoint

It’s a fairly well-known fact that how we handle what comes our way in life is largely dependent upon our viewpoint. It affects how we see the past. It also affects how we see the present and the future.

The antique window pictured above is hanging in my living room. I can change the background. Therefore, I can change what I see through my window. For the Christmas holidays, I stapled a holiday scene to the back. But we cannot so easily change our viewpoint on life.

I always get pensive at this time of year. I suppose looking back at the year ending and seeing it with 20/20 vision gives perspective. But, when looking forward to the new year beginning, we can see nothing for certain. We may make resolutions of one kind or another or we may make plans to do something we want or need to do. But the truth is that we don’t know what lies ahead. What is also true is that we have no control over what lies ahead!

Looking Back

There is no doubt that this has been a tough year for many, including me, my family and many people that I know and love. I think back to when the year began and all the hope that we held for a better year than 2020 had proven to be. However, that’s not exactly how it seemed to go in many cases.

Many people have had tragic losses this year. Some losses were due to catastrophic weather events or devastating illness. Some losses were the unexpected deaths of loved ones. And still other losses were the emotional kind – hidden so that other people can’t see. How we navigate the hard things about 2021 depends on our viewpoint: what we see through our “window”.

Looking Forward

So how do we navigate an unknown 2022? How do we process the losses we have endured in 2021? How do we incorporate the lessons learned from the past into our daily living of the present and the future? I suppose it will be different for each person. Here are some of the ways I will incorporate a positive viewpoint into my life.

Walk with Jesus

First, I have already begun to be more deliberate in walking with Jesus. It’s so easy to put my focus on the problems and worries around me. But I have found that if I can carve out a regular time each day, preferably in the morning, to spend with Him in prayer and reading His Word, it affects my “window”. It allows me to begin my day with the perspective that I am not alone and that He is in control and will walk with me. It puts my mind where it needs to be.

Choose Love

Secondly, as admittedly difficult as it is sometime, I must choose love: love in my thoughts, love in my words, love in my actions and love in my choices. What makes it difficult is that it is so easy to focus on me…what hurts me, what affects me, what’s good for me, etc. It is also easy to focus on others…but not in a good way. Focusing on their faults, their failures to live up to expectations, and their unkind words and choices only derails my viewpoint! But, when I focus on love: showing love to others and saying loving things in a loving tone, it IS good for me and keeps my focus where it should be!

Be Determined

As a person who has dealt with the trappings of perfectionism most of my life, it’s so easy to focus on the details that drive us crazy. But, when we can rise above the messy details and see the big picture, we can make choices that say, “I love you anyway.” I will tell you that it is not easy! I will also tell you that it takes determination. It also takes practice!

Choose Your Viewpoint

Do we have a choice what we will see when we look through our window as I do with my antique window? No, unfortunately, we do not. However, we do have the choice HOW we look through our window! Our viewpoint, whether selfish, critical and frightened or loving, peaceful and hopeful, will determine how what we see affects us!

I have no idea what lies ahead in your 2022, just as I have no idea what lies ahead in mine. I want to live each day making each moment count. My goal is to make sure every person in my life knows how special they are to me. At the end of 2022 I want to look back and know that I didn’t miss opportunities to show love and compassion. I want to know that I showed Jesus’ love to those around me, even to those who are unlovely or unlovable. What will your viewpoint be going forward?

This is a good guideline: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Philippians%204%3A8&version=ESV. You can’t go wrong if you keep your thoughts on these things!

I wish for you a peaceful and happy 2022! May God bless you!

Saying good-bye is difficult, whether it is expected or suddenly unexpected. As I have written in a few previous posts, we have dealt with many unexpected deaths here on de Good Life Farm. Of course, we raise cattle and chickens for meat, so those are planned and expected good-byes, but even so, are difficult. Life is precious, whether it is a meat chicken you have raised from “chickhood” or a steer you have loved and raised from birth. We take caring for our animals very seriously and thus, the loss of life is painful, regardless of whose life it is.

As I sat on the bucket milking Mocha this morning, I was very sad knowing that the events of the day would be very hard–hard on her and on me. If you have read My Name is Mocha, you know that Mocha left her mama behind when she came to our farm almost seven years ago, and it was very traumatic for her. She was fifteen months old and pregnant with her first calf. She cried the whole trip through town to our farm and for days after. I later found out Jersey cried for Mocha as we pulled away.

Mocha and Jersey playing around in the pasture after days in the barn

THE WHO?

Jersey is Mocha’s mama. Jersey is also the cow I learned to milk on! I am thankful that she and Ralph, her farmer, were patient teachers. I had such untrained, fumble fingers.

Ralph, Jersey’s former owner, visiting to say goodbye

Jersey has been mama to Coco (Mocha’s older sister), Mocha, Billy (Coco and Billy were both born while still at Ralphs’ farm), our sweet Oreo and our sweet Herbie. She has also been grandma to Mocha’s girls: Cocoa (named after her aunt), Caramel, Truffle, Hazel, Elsie and Daisy and great grandma to Snickers, Caramel’s daughter. Needless to say, without Jersey, there wouldn’t be a “de Good Life Farm”.

Jersey’s milk wasn’t the first fresh milk I had tasted, but I and my family, as well as a host of other families who are part of our herd share program have enjoyed her rich creamy milk for a grand total of about eight years! Our vet lovingly calls her “a lean, mean milking machine”. She’s not really mean. She is stubborn and will bully Mocha if she has the chance to get to fresh hay, water, feed or mineral first. I guess maybe she figures she is the matron and deserves to be first!

THE “WHY”

Jersey doesn’t “show” her heats at all (other than occasionally trying to “ride” Jeff) This makes getting her bred a challenge. When she came to our farm in 2016, we thought she was pregnant, but soon found out she wasn’t. Eventually we were able to get her successfully bred and in 2018 she gave us our precious Oreo! What a sweet boy he was! Then in 2019, she gave us our sweet Herbie! She is two for two on sweet boys for us. The problem is that in five years, trying a number of protocols, we have only been successful at getting her pregnant twice. Two calves when she “should/could” have given us five is fairly significant.

THE “NOW WHAT?”

Unfortunately, there aren’t many options when you have an eleven-year-old cow who can’t be bred. And it is also unfortunate that we cannot afford to feed and bed a cow who cannot be bred. Together, Jeff and I prayed that God would show us what to do.

Eventually, I made an appointment to have her sold at auction. It broke my heart but sometimes being a “farmer” means making very difficult decisions with something other than your heart. Then on Monday, I placed a call to our vet’s office to see if they knew of any other options. They said we could try to sell her on a local site as a “pet” cow who is still lactating. So, I placed an ad.

Within an hour or so, I received a response from a guy who has a cow who is getting ready to be dry in preparation for calving and he was interested in Jersey. So, today, he is coming to take a look at her. It would thrill me if she could continue to provide her rich milk to another family and live a little longer. We will see, but we definitely felt this was a sign from God that we were on the right track.

Mocha (l.) and Jersey (r.) in their barn stalls

THE “KNOWING”

So, as I was saying earlier, it hurts me for Mocha, knowing what I know: that she will again have to say “good-bye” to her mama and this time there will be no happy reunion as there was in her book. She will cry and she will mourn and that will break my heart. It may affect her milk production for a few days and I am prepared for that. However, the wonderful thing about cows is that they are very adaptive and eventually she will become accustomed to a new normal.

THE “NEW”

What Mocha doesn’t know is that rather than keeping the stall next to her empty which will be a constant reminder of what she has lost, tonight or this weekend, we will attempt to bring in her daughter, Elsie. Elsie should be coming into heat soon and we will try to get her bred. She’s a bit of a wild child…”Diva” like her mama, with a little wild thrown in since she has been pretty much free in the pasture since she was four months old. Getting a lead rope on her will be challenging. Eventually, we will succeed!

Elsie (Mocha’s daughter from 2019) and Herbie are buddies and have been since she was born in December two years ago. They are the “queen” and “king” of the calves’ pasture. They actually are more like brother and sister than uncle and niece. We won’t take her away from him for good until March–just long enough to settle her down and get her bred and hopefully in the process, ease the pain for Mocha.

THE GOODBYE

You know, it’s so good when you ask God for guidance and then you look back and see His hand. Jersey just left for her new home. It’s even better than we had hoped for her.

The guy I mentioned above came with his daughter and after looking her over and asking the questions he needed answers to, he decided she is what he was looking for!

She dutifully followed me out the front door with only one quick backwards glance toward the back of the barn where she usually exits. She followed me through the back yard to the waiting trailer. I stepped up into the trailer and she followed me without hesitation except for the step up into the trailer. That hesitation wasn’t surprising as cows do not like to step up into anything!

Herbie was obviously bothered and because he was bothered, so were Elsie and the calves. Anything to do with his mama is always of concern to him! Last year when she passed by him on the way to the barn, he ran to meet her. Jersey? Well, let’s just say she hardly gave him a sidewards glance!

Herbie and Elsie upset and confused as they see Jersey get on the trailer

THE FUTURE

Now, not only will Jersey provide milk for a family during the dry period of their regular milk cow, she may actually have the opportunity to get bred! They have a yearling bull that will run with her. That is like the icing on the cake for me and makes this post so much more happy and hopeful! Jersey has a new home, so this is just the next chapter in her life! I think that means it’s time for a new farm book!

Thanks for reading! If you are interested in my children’s books about the farm, you may check out my website http://www.dianeorrauthor.com and click on the “Books” page.

Month: December 2021

Through What Window are You Looking?