by Bobbi Phelps
“After you left,” Mike said, scowling with obvious annoyance, “I fell asleep on the couch. Before I knew it, that damn pig was in my face!”
“What?” I exclaimed. “She got out of her pen?”
“Yes! She slobbered wet snot on my face. Then she snorted in my ear!”
“I can’t believe it,” I said in astonishment. “How’d you get her?” I asked, remembering how hard it was for Matt and me to capture her the week before.
“Once I was fully awake, I realized what had happened. I yelled at it and chased it around the living room and into the dining room,” he said. “It kept squealing and then it ran back to the laundry room.”
Imagining this large man being awakened by a slobbering pig and having him chase her around the house was too much. I dropped to my knees, collapsing on the floor, howling with laughter. Mike didn’t think it was one bit funny. But he couldn’t help it. His lips started to quiver and then a smile came over his face.
“You have to admit, Mike, that was really funny,” I said.
Polly left the laundry room the following day. Faint rays of light fell into the barn as I introduced the horse and pig to each other. The little piglet immediately bonded with Smoky, imprinting as it’s called. She soon considered herself a horse, shadowing the large black animal wherever he went, grazing right beside him. Smoky, however, did not like this tiny intruder one bit. When I initially carried Polly into the barn, Smoky stretched his neck to stare at the little black ball. One sniff and he snorted, flattened his ears, and shook his head with disapproval. Eventually Smoky adapted to Polly but he never really approved of her.
The morning sun was already high in the sky a few months later when I carried a pail of leftover food scraps across our driveway and out to the barn. Polly and Smoky were in the pasture, grazing together. Whenever Smoky moved to a new section of grass, Polly embraced his every step. Smoky stood a good four feet higher than Polly, but as far as the pig was concerned, they were twins, adjoined in a forever embrace. Smoky let out a soft whinny as he saw me approach.
“Come on, you two. See what I have,” I yelled to the black pair.
Polly snorted and grunted and ran as only pigs do, her squat little legs rushing back and forth as she raced on her toes toward me. As soon as she reached my side, she pushed her nose forward and gave a huge sniff, leaving sloppy snout marks across my irrigating boots. Because a pig’s eyesight is so poor, it identifies objects by smelling. In France, pigs are used to sniff out truffles three feet below the ground. Not being a gourmet chef, I discovered truffles are a tuber, a delicacy used in cooking. And one I had never used, or even seen.
“Okay, Polly. Here it is,” I said as I upended the bucket, the day’s food scraps cascading into her trough. She squealed with delight and dug into a pile of bread, lettuce, potatoes, and meat. Polly was several months old and growing fast. She was bigger than Jack and weighed close to a hundred pounds. Trying not to show favoritism, I gave Smoky a handful of oats and a flake of hay.
After another year had passed, Polly became our second guard animal. Besides being greeted by a black Lab, any house guest would have a large black pig placing her nose at the same height as their side window. Because we had an electric fence that we turned off once Smoky knew his boundaries, Polly would slip underneath and approach all autos coming into our driveway. No way would anyone want to tangle with her as she snorted at their car window.
Whenever I checked on Polly, I always wore irrigating boots. Any exposed area became covered with slimy pig snot. In the evening I brought food leftovers while I cleaned out the stalls and put in fresh straw. Using a pitchfork, I stabbed the straw bale, ducked under the wire fence, and heaved straw into the barn.
Once Polly finished rooting in her trough, she waddled into her stall and lay down. I’d talk to her, using baby words, and told her stories. She seemed to listen as she cocked her head and looked at me. When I sat beside her, cross legged in the straw, I massaged her body. She loved it. Polly closed her eyes, tiny in the massive block of her head, and made pleasant moaning sounds and rolled on her side. I rubbed her ears and noticed how soft they were, as “soft as a sow’s ear,” an expression I’d heard for years and definitely realized was true. Smoky stood in his stall, eating his hay and oats and glancing periodically over the railing between the two stalls. I told Polly about my day’s activities and continued to stroke her body. Pigs don’t have fur like most animals, but have dense individual hairs, coarse and bristly, protruding from their rough hides. They also don’t have sweat glands. To lower her temperature, Polly would lie in muddy holes to cool the surface of her thick skin. As Polly grew, I asked Dr. Monroe to examine her.
“Should I have her spayed?” I asked, thinking she was like a dog or cat that needed to be neutered.
“Why? Are you expecting some boar to come into your yard?” he asked, almost laughing as he answered.
“No, I guess not,” I said, feeling foolish and knowing I had made another “city” comment to our country vet. Thank goodness, Bob had a lot of patience and enjoyed his visits to see us.
* * *
Later the following summer I asked Matt if he wanted to ride to the gravel pit. I inserted a metal bit into Smoky’s mouth and raised the bridle’s headpiece above his ears and pulled his forelock above the browband. As usual, I wore a riding helmet, boots, and half chaps.
“Sure. I’ll get my bike,” he said with a smile.
I swung the English saddle and pad onto Smoky’s back and reached under his belly to tighten the girth belt, buckling its two saddle straps. Once I undid the fence gate and mounted Smoky, Matt jumped on his blue bicycle and pedaled away. He called to Jack as he raced down the driveway. Polly, wearing a bright pink collar, followed the three of us to the front yard. As we started toward the dirt road, I heard a meow and turned to see Buddy, our black cat, rushing to join us.
By that point, we had owned Polly for three years. I knew she no longer thought of herself as a pig. She had imprinted on Smoky. She weighed over four hundred pounds and trailed Smoky everywhere, chomping on tufts of grass right beside him. Smoky and I guided the impromptu parade with Matt and Jack beside us. Twenty feet behind were Polly and Buddy. We slowly progressed the mile distance from our driveway to the gravel pit.
I eased into the rhythm of Smoky’s walk as we passed huge boulders stacked on the side of the road, leftovers from when the original ranch had been carved from the prairie. They were the size of small cars and this was the exact place where Smoky often spooked. It seemed to be his annual ritual to attempt to buck me off and another reason why I always wore a helmet. As we rode by the boulders, I squeezed my knees together and turned Smoky’s head to look directly at the rocks. He relaxed and our parade resumed. The dirt road was pitted with rough stones, and it became increasingly difficult for Matt to balance his bicycle. The bike wheels shifted every time he pedaled on the irregular ground.
Just as we reached the junction to the gravel pit and were beginning to turn left and venture up the trail, Matt’s bike skidded on the uneven road. He fell to the side and his body crashed to the ground. Jack barked several times and Smoky jumped straight into the air. When Smoky’s hind hooves slammed into the dirt, one of his feet missed Matt’s head by less than an inch. It was so close I saw no separation between his bone-crushing hoof and Matt’s head. Matt got up and shook himself off, not realizing how close he had come to being maimed or killed. I dismounted and walked to Matt, checking his head and hair. Everything looked good. He wasn’t hurt, just a few scratches. With tears welling in my eyes, the incident reminded me once again of the constant danger of living around large animals. Even if there had been no intent.
“Let’s go back,” I said as I placed my foot high in the stirrup and pulled myself onto the saddle. “Your bike can’t handle this rough trail. And Polly and Buddy can’t keep up.”
“Okay. I’ll race you back,” Matt said as he jumped on his bike. He was off, churning up a haze of dust
with no thought of his possible injury. Jack ran right beside him. Smoky and I followed along with the last two of the parade trailing far behind. By the time we reached our driveway, the group had scattered along the length of the road. I shortened my reins and stopped Smoky, twisting in the saddle to make sure the stragglers made it back to our property. Once inside the electric fence, I dismounted and closed the gate. After removing his saddle and bridle and returning them to the tack room, I rewarded Smoky with a carrot.
“Wash up, Matt. Dad will be home shortly,” I said and walked into the kitchen to start our lunch.
Chapter Thirty
Hailstorm
“Hey, Mike. I’m going to photograph the combines today. The sky is perfect for photos. Clear.”
“Okay. Bring Matt. I’m in the field behind the Adams’ house. Clear.”
With harvest in full swing, the late August weather turned hot. The day before had been a scorcher, a blanket of searing heat. I stood on the back of Mike’s pickup and watched, nearly blinded by the sun, as the men crossed the field in Harvester combines. My Nikon camera was out and ready. Four combines moved through the grain, one behind the other but in separate rows. A dark navy sky shadowed the background while the red combines crossed the yellow field in the foreground. Streaks as light as butter, smooth and white as candle wax, graced the grain stalks. This was the photo I had been waiting for.
The colors were crisp, clear, and bright. I took numerous shots, and then jumped from the bed of the pickup and climbed into the cab. I drove from the field and back to our home as grain shafts danced in the wind, and the men in the combines continued to harvest. Soon clouds gathered, crowding the sky and shutting out the sun. Back at the house I heard a low rumble of thunder that heralded the approaching storm.
And then it came. Hail the size of marbles burst from the sky, pounding the ground and beating against our house like gun shots at a rifle range. For fifteen shocking minutes, devastating ice balls inundated Sky Ranch. I stood in the dining room as the blackened sky moved across the horizon, blowing swiftly to the east. Then it stopped as if a spigot had been turned off. Sun fought to break through the angry clouds, and Mike, Matt, and I drove out to witness the damage. Whole sections were flattened and destroyed. Weather always played a huge part of their income. Sky Ranch’s crop and its ensuing money had, today, been damaged in a flash.
Mike and his brother, Don, could do everything right, plant and harvest at the right time, enjoy high future stock market prices, and then have crushing weather conditions. I never knew how tenuous their occupation was. Once I moved to the ranch, I became exceptionally aware of the weather and its ensuing results.
The next day I passed Mike on 4900 going in the opposite direction. We stopped and he rolled down his pickup window and rested his shoulder against the door.
“Hey. Where’re you going?” he asked.
“I’m on my way to Twin,” I answered. “Going to buy groceries. Do you need anything?”
“Not now. Call back before you leave.”
“Okay,” I said as I started the engine and pulled away from his truck, driving north on 4900. Looking in the rearview mirror, I saw another pickup pull into the spot I had just left. The two men yakked across the span of their trucks, maybe chatting about specific farm issues but most likely talking about the hailstorm. Who knew how long they sat there, parked in the middle of the road? They certainly didn’t have to worry about traffic. In a full day, maybe a dozen vehicles drove over the road. We really were in the middle of nowhere.
Chapter Thirty-One
The Little Farm in the Canyon
“Want to buy some property in the canyon?” asked one of Mike’s fishing friends from Sun Valley.
“I don’t know. Tell me about it,” Mike requested.
“We used it as a hunting and fishing retreat. It’s located on the Snake River down in a canyon between Filer and Buhl. The hundred and fifty acres was once a cherry orchard. I think in the 1930s.”
Mike and I checked out the parcel the very next day. Most of the fruit trees were dead and looked like dark, gaunt ghosts, misshapen and protruding from overgrown weeds. It was covered with hundreds of Russian olive trees, and the land had been left fallow for at least thirty years. Because the parcel bordered a half mile of river, we saw the potential as a small residential development and decided to buy it. Mike and I still lived at Sky Ranch but now he and I owned some land by ourselves. We called it the “Little Farm.”
Once the purchase had been completed, I realized what farming really entailed. Instead of a large home at the ranch, we lived in a twenty-foot trailer with no running water and no bathroom. Granted, we were only there for long weekends but that was enough.
The first year of ownership was an exciting time of discovery but it practically did me in. I felt like I was living in a foreign country. Working a farm was so unlike anything I had ever experienced. Certainly nothing like my youth at country clubs and private beaches. Not only was I making three meals a day but I was also hand-irrigating recently planted trees and removing trash, weeds, stones, and stumps from our newly purchased land. Matt and I, along with a few of his buddies, trudged from the Snake River carrying five-gallon buckets to water twenty Lombardy poplars planted as a windbreak. We smelled the dampness as we moved through the wetlands bordering the river, dark mud sucking at our boots. As each day faded, I bent at my waist, my hands on my knees, and just breathed. Irrigating by buckets sapped my stamina. Sweat ran down my face and stung my eyes. It was hard work. Local kids, even though they were paid, usually lasted only a day or two. Matt and I didn’t have a choice.
Mike and Mario alternated digging ditches with Sky Ranch’s backhoe. They formed numerous trenches, diverting part of a stream flowing from a canyon waterfall and ran it through the upper part of the Little Farm. Because we needed to irrigate our land, we purchased water rights when we bought the property. Just because a stream ran through our property did not mean we had the right to divert it. We had to purchase the “right.” Once the water started flowing, the place began to green, and struggling fruit trees once again flourished.
Whenever there was a moment to spare, Mike, Matt, and I removed rocks, rubbish, and loads of dead trees. We put the wood into a pile for the evening’s hotdog roast. The rest was thrown into a giant cavity Mike had dug with a backhoe. We found furniture, tires, cans, and seemingly miles of barbed wire. All were flung into the deep pit and burned. Using a tractor, Mike covered the hole with four feet of dirt and leveled the spot. He planted corn over it the next year. But not everything was discarded into the deep cavity. We saved a 1930s car frame and an oak-wheeled wagon. Mike plowed a new entrance road around the two antiques, and I planted white and yellow daisies close beside them. The Little Farm began to take shape.
Then we tackled the endless Russian olive trees. Although beautiful, grey-green trees, they multiplied like weeds and had sharp, three-inch-long thorns protruding from every branch. No longer a debutante wannabe, my job was to crawl underneath the lowest branches, hanging about a foot from the ground, wrap a metal chain around the trunk, and crawl back out. My jeans and chest chafed against the ground as I wriggled back and forth; my battered body taking the brunt of the chore. Matt grasped the end of the chain from me and handed it to his father who then attached it to the frame of the backhoe. Matt and I stood far to the side while Mike climbed onto his machine and put it in reverse. Once he pulled out the tree, he dragged it to a growing pile of shrubs, piled haphazardly like Lincoln logs that were burned the following day. We worked many hours and even into the evening. The backhoe had strong headlights, and we could see long after the sun had set.
During one particular night, I slithered under a Russian olive tree, gripping the chain in my right hand and fought through a tangle of thorn-covered branches. The needles on the ground ripped at my jeans and tore my T-shirt. Hemmed in, I reached out to wrap the metal cable around a trunk. As I stretched toward the tree base, a branch snapped at m
y face. The nasty thorns dove into my cheekbone and punctured my skin just below my eye. I stopped and backed out on my hands and knees. Mike saw me in the tractor’s headlights and realized I didn’t have the chain. He jumped off the machine and came over to me. Noticing drops of blood sliding down my face, he wrapped an arm around my shoulder, and I wept into his chest. I was exhausted.
“Okay. That’s enough,” he said. “Let’s go home.”
He turned off the machine and the three of us walked, filthy and drained, back to the trailer by the glow of a flashlight. I could barely stand but I opened two cans of chili, added chopped onions and grated cheddar cheese, and heated our meal. Saltine crackers and glasses of milk supplemented the dinner. Dirty as we were, we fell into our beds and were asleep within minutes.
By the next year, Mike had a waterline and septic tank installed. The Angler’s Company purchased a one-bedroom RV with a living room pop out, a bathroom, and a mini kitchen. This was heaven compared to the year before. We pushed hay bales against the outside foundation, insulating the trailer from both the searing heat and the freezing cold of the canyon floor.
Friends and family dropped by to help with chores and to partake in our evening campfires. They’d gather fallen branches, knock over dead trees, and collect wayward rocks. After several hours of work, we’d sit around the bonfire with sodas, a beer or two, and talk about the day’s activities. I’d bring out a plate of hot dogs, buns, and potato chips. We took sticks and speared the dogs lengthwise, cooking them until they were slightly burned. At the end of the meal, we often had s’mores. Mike’s grown children, Christa and Blaine, as well as our Twin Falls friends, Carol Roseberry and Del Carraway, were our normal guests. But we never really knew who would drop by. Sometimes fishing and hunting friends and sometimes our Friday-night bridge group. We always seemed to have a crowd during our weekend roasts.
