Dear County Agent Guy

by Jerry Nelson

  I gestured toward the marsh. “You know,” I said to Chris, “there’s a lot of dead horses out there.” He gave me that “Dad’s lost it again” look, so I explained: Fifteen years ago, when his mother and I had just moved onto this farm, my father and I had embarked on this very same fence repair mission. This farm had been Dad’s boyhood home. As he and I rested on this escarpment, he told me about the horses.

  The thirties were a hard time, I explained. There was the drought, there were the dust storms and the clouds of grasshoppers. And then there was the mysterious disease that could strike the horses. I told Chris, as Dad had told me, how workhorses could be laid low by this ailment. Horses would often die of this malady, which was commonly called sleeping sickness. Those that survived were frequently rendered incapable of performing any useful amount of work.

  This marshland was dry at that time, and since the digging here would be easy, horses that fell victim to this disease were often dragged out to this place to be buried. Graves the size of grand pianos were hand-excavated with picks and shovels.

  Those horses were not merely tractors with hair. They were more like huge pets, creatures who had been raised from birth, had been given names, and were known by their distinct personalities. The death of a good workhorse was more than an economic hardship; it was akin to losing a member of the family.

  And back in those days, the losses were already high. For some farmers, losing a good horse to sleeping sickness may have been the final straw that pushed them over the brink and into the depths of despair.

  We pondered this in silence for a long while, the quiet of the moment broken only by the chirruping of frogs down in the bog and the distant honking from a pair of Canada geese. Chris began to scout around for interesting rocks and found one that was flecked with fool’s gold. We strolled down to the water’s edge and chucked a few stones just to hear them splash and to help them complete their voyage to the bottomland, a geological journey that was halted ten thousand years ago.

  My stomach told me that it was about lunchtime. On the walk back toward the house, we found a hole that some animal had dug and speculated as to whether or not a fox was building a den. We found a colony of red ants and used a stick to stir up their mound, then watched as the insects rushed around to repair the damage.

  As we neared the house, I took a leisurely glance at my watch. My stomach clock had been fairly accurate, I noted with some satisfaction. But then I saw the date. What was it about that date?

  Of course. Good God! How could have I forgotten? That day was the fourth anniversary of my father’s death.

  A wave of guilt swept over me. I could have—no, I should have—thought of something more fitting than checking the pasture fence to mark the occasion. But then I remembered that morning all those years ago when Dad and I had completed this same spring ritual, at a time when the strapping young man now walking at my side was still curled up in the muffled darkness of his mother’s womb. I thought of the stony hill and of the story of the horses and how it had now been passed on to a new generation. And I realized that I could not have honored Dad in any better fashion. •

  Deep Diaper Doo-Doo

  Ihate to brag, but I was the first to discover it. Back when our first son was just a baby, I stumbled across the ultimate antidote to masculinity.

  So, what is it? What is this kryptonite-like substance that can make any man—even such paragons of machismo as Rambo or Norman Schwarzkopf—turn into blubbering sissies? Those of you who are married with children already know the answer. Soiled diapers.

  What is it about baby poo-poo that can make a strong man weak and an average man lapse into a coma? I’m not sure, but I think it’s because the stuff is nuclear.

  Now, there are some guys who have the ability to change stinky diapers without so much as passing out. In fact, they don’t even seem to mind this ungodly task! These men are not normal. They must have some sort of defect in their olfactory system; the same defect that allows women to soak themselves in perfume, yet somehow survive.

  My wife was always disgusted with my aversion to changing soiled diapers. “I can’t believe it!” she would say. “You’re a dairy farmer! You work with tons of manure every day! What’s the big deal about changing a messy little diaper?”

  I tried to tell her that cow manure was different. For one thing, it wasn’t radioactive. She whacked me upside the head with a box of Pampers. “Just go change the baby!” she ordered. “Sheesh! If it was up to you, that kid would be starting second grade still wearing the same diaper!” That’s how she saw things. From my point of view, it was either him or me.

  One day, my wife called me into the nursery, saying that she had something to show me. Her eyes held that twinkle that told me something special was waiting. Our son was no doubt gifted! Perhaps, at this young age, he had already mastered the Rubik’s Cube! Or maybe he had perfected cold fusion, or was doing something really useful, such as engraving plates so we could print our own twenty-dollar bills!

  I ran to the nursery, my mind racing with anticipation. There in the crib was our son—naked—and next to him was a diaper that had been filled well beyond capacity with a greenish goo.

  The child had done a poo-poo. Not just a little one, though. No, this was a fill-up-the-diaper, Guinness World Records kind of poo-poo. The Mother of All Poo-Poos. My knees buckled, my brain reeled, and I broke out in a cold sweat. I suddenly didn’t feel very well. This wasn’t exactly the kind of talent I had hoped for!

  “Look!” exclaimed my wife. “Have you ever seen anything like this?” My stomach rising to my throat, I croaked that I was trying not to think about it. Gathering the last of my strength, I staggered to the door. On my way out, I bumped the light switch and the room went dark.

  And there in the blackness was a pale green glow!

  The day before, the little guy had consumed a houseplant. Not the entire plant, mind you, but he fairly defoliated the thing and helped himself to some potting soil for dessert.

  A frantic call to the pediatrician followed. After describing the houseplant our son had decimated, we were told not to worry, that the only result may be “a slight laxative effect.” Riiight.

  So when the news came out that the Department of Defense was in the market for a new antiterrorist weapon system, I wrote a letter to the Pentagon. I told them that the terrorists could be quickly brought to heel if we were to dump planeloads of soiled diapers on the bad guys’ secret lairs. I soon received a terse reply. The generals had considered my plan, they said, and deemed it “a gross violation of the Geneva Conventions.”

  I showed the letter to my wife. “You men,” she snorted. “You’re such a bunch of wimps.” •

  Uncle Wilmer

  What do you say when a family farmer dies?

  Is it enough to say that his rows were straight, that his furrows ran true? That he kept his fences taut and that you never saw any thistles growing upon his land? That he was a good neighbor in the biblical sense, one who was always quick to lend a hand in time of need? Small things, good things, all of those. But somehow, not nearly enough.

  These questions came to the fore when my uncle Wilmer, Dad’s brother, passed away. Like Dad, Wilmer died suddenly and unexpectedly while doing chores.

  The next day, my wife and I drove the mile and a quarter east from our house over to Bev and Wilmer’s place. As we approached their front door, we were met by Wilmer’s rotund blue heeler. I stopped to pet the old dog and wondered who might scratch him behind the ears now that his master was gone.

  We went inside. Awkward handshakes from Bev and Wilmer’s sons, the now-grown men who, once upon a time, were the boys I spent summers with, playing 4-H softball. Gentle hugs from Bev and Wilmer’s two daughters, their Nordic good looks reminding me of an old photograph of our youthful grandma Nelson on her wedding day.

  Small things, good things.

 
Next came a big hug from Bev. Teary eyes and lumps in throats. But what to say? We all know that the day will come when we will have planted our last row of corn, when we will finish our final harvest. A day when we will feed our last cow or sow and climb out of that tractor or combine cab for the final time.

  We who work with the rhythm of the seasons and the cycles of life know these things all too well. But none of that seemed to matter now.

  I thought of telling Bev that Wilmer had lived his life as a good farmer should, communing daily with the Almighty beneath the great cathedral of the sky. That his family and farming were a part of his soul and that he would never be any farther away than the soil he so lovingly tilled.

  It was as if Bev had read my thoughts. “Wilmer was doing what he loved to do,” I heard her say.

  A good thing, that. A very good thing indeed.

  If there be such a thing as Farmers’ Heaven, Wilmer is up there right now. I can imagine him sitting on the seat of his Super H on the headland of a field near the house. The vernal breeze wafts over him benevolently; the slumbering land stretches out before him like a canvas awaiting the master’s brush.

  Turning on the seat, Wilmer gazes back toward the farmstead. He can see his wife hanging clothes on the line while their young children play on the emerald lawn. The sun casts a golden hue and warms Wilmer’s face.

  Wilmer puts the plow into the ground, lets out the clutch, and throttles up. The plow bites into the rich black loam and slices a clean, sharp furrow. Wilmer smells the aroma of freshly turned earth and smiles broadly.

  And he knows that this is a good thing. A very big and very good thing. •

  Dedicated to the memory of Wilmer A. Nelson,

  December 24, 1927–January 24, 2001.

  Husband Training Made Easy

  Our younger son was six years old and I was schooling him in the fine art of advanced recoil weaponry construction when I went to my wife’s dresser drawer to requisition some essential equipment. To my surprise, I found a hidden book.

  I wasn’t surprised that my wife knew how to read. What troubled me was the title of the book. It was called How to Make Your Man Behave in 21 Days or Less, Using the Secrets of Professional Dog Trainers and was written by Karen Salmansohn. (This is an actual book that is still in print.)

  I flipped through the tome. Several pages were dog-eared, and I noticed there were numerous passages that had been heavily underlined. I had just begun to thumb through it when I heard approaching footsteps. I was trying to bury the evidence when my wife entered the room.

  “And just what do you think you’re doing?”

  “I . . . um . . . you see, I was teaching the boy how to build a slingshot and we were looking for something to use for a sling, so I thought, ‘Hey, why not make it a double-barrel?’ and so we thought maybe we could borrow one of your Maidenforms . . .”

  She swatted me across the nose with a copy of Woman’s World magazine. “Get your grubby paws out of my underwear drawer! Bad boy! Bad, bad boy!”

  I later got to thinking, an activity that is always fraught with hazards. How long had my wife had that book? And how had it affected our relationship? What about our boys? Were they also being “trained”?

  Several incidents suddenly jumped into sharp focus. I remembered how, while potty training our boys, my wife had lined the entire bathroom with newspapers. And that time we visited the big city, it was she who insisted that both our boys be put on leashes.

  I considered the suppertime ritual at our house. Up until now, I had thought it was cute the way she had conditioned the boys to come running at the sound of the can opener.

  As I rolled these things over in my mind, I became incensed. What did she think she was doing? Running a kennel? The thought raised my hackles. I went hunting for my wife, intent on chewing her out. Bounding into the kitchen, I growled, “I have a bone to pick with you!”

  My wife turned away and waved her hands at me. “Egad!” she said. “Your breath is horrible! Have you been drinking out of the toilet again? Here, chew on this. Now, what were you saying?”

  “It’s that book!” I said, munching on the Milk-Bone. “You’ve been treating the boys and me like . . . like . . .” My train of thought evaporated as she dangled a luscious strip of bacon in front of my nose.

  “Do you want this, boy? Do you? Then go fetch my slippers! Go on! Fetch, boy!”

  I reeled my tongue back in and wiped the saliva off my chin. “Wait a minute!” I barked. “I’m not falling for that old trick again! As I was saying . . .”

  She came over and began to scratch me behind the ears. I felt becalmed as she spoke to me in a low, soothing voice. “There, there,” she cooed, “let’s not ruffle your fur. By the way, do you remember what day this is?”

  Uh-oh! I knew what that meant! I tried to slink from the room. She caught me by the collar and began to drag me in the direction of the bathroom. I struggled and yelped and whined.

  “Oh, be quiet!” she commanded. “I don’t like this any more than you do! Come on! You know darn well it’s time for your bath!”

  Later, I sat on the front steps and reflected upon the day’s events. Our youngest boy came out and plopped down beside me.

  “Mom’s mad at you, isn’t she?”

  “Yep. I’m in the doghouse again.”

  “She really yelled when you shook yourself and got that flea shampoo in her eyes! I bet she won’t let us finish that slingshot now.”

  “Probably not.”

  “That’s too bad. It would have been the ultimate anti-cat weapon.”

  We shared a moment of sullen silence. Then the boy said something that always makes my ears perk up.

  “Hey, Dad, look! A squirrel!” •

  Monkey Business

  When our nephew Adam and his wife, Janine, had their baby boy, it was a momentous event for our family. Ayden is the first child to be born to the next generation and my mother’s first great-grandchild.

  We wanted to mark the event with a gift, but had few ideas regarding what the new parents might want or need. We opted to send them a toy stuffed monkey, along with the following toy monkey story we wrote to go with it:

  The summer when I was seven years old I met a red-haired eight-year-old boy named Steve.

  Steve was spending the summer at our neighbor’s farm, and I was brought in as a potential playmate for him. Within moments of our meeting, Steve suggested that we go out to the grove to climb trees. This caused me to take an instant liking to him. Our friendship—which has now spanned more than four decades—was cemented by a story he shared while we were up in the first tree we climbed together.

  What he told me was a joke, perhaps the first one I had ever heard. It went something like this:

  There was a hog farmer who wanted to win the prize for the biggest pig at the county fair. He decided to cheat a bit by forcing a cork into the hind end of his largest hog. The pig quickly grew heavier and heavier until it became unbelievably huge.

  The farmer took the hog to the county fair, where it was judged to be the biggest pig. The judges were just about to give the farmer the trophy for his hog when an escaped circus monkey scampered into the arena.

  The monkey saw the cork and decided to give it a tug. After the ensuing pandemonium died down, a newspaper reporter interviewed eyewitnesses.

  “What did you see?” he asked one of the judges.

  “Poop flying all over!” he replied. (At this point Steve extravagantly pantomimed mopping his face, which caused me to chuckle.)

  “What did you see?” he asked the second judge.

  “Poop flying all over!” (Again with the wiping of the face. Many more giggles.)

  “And what did you see?” the reporter asked a bystander.

  “Monkey trying to get the cork back in!”

  I nearly fell out of the tre
e due to massive paroxysms of laughter. The image of the hapless little monkey struggling to replace that cork in the midst of a fire hose–like blast of pig poop was burned onto my mental retinas. It remains there to this day.

  For a seven-year-old boy, it just doesn’t get any funnier than that.

  Flash forward more than twenty years; I am the father of two little boys of my own. It has become a ritual for me to read them bedtime stories, which I am glad to do. It gives me an excuse to expose them to such literary triumphs as Calvin and Hobbes, The Far Side, and the works of Patrick McManus, the author of such cerebral gems as Never Sniff a Gift Fish and Real Ponies Don’t Go Oink!

  One night, we found ourselves short of reading material and the boys were clamoring for something more. On sheer impulse, I grabbed a toy stuffed monkey named Monkey and retold the pig joke with Monkey pantomiming the part of the monkey.

  The boys giggled themselves silly. “Do another!” they exclaimed at the conclusion of the joke. Still running on impulse, I began, “One day, Monkey was walking along when he found a stick of dynamite. ‘Wow!’ said Monkey, ‘This is my lucky day! How often does a guy find a big, fat cigar like this? Now, if I could just find a lighter . . .’ ”

  Monkey went on to have similar misadventures nearly every night. Most of them involved substances like superglue, nitroglycerin, and oil of ipecac, and very often a combination of ingredients.

  And now, Adam, you are a brand-new daddy. This job comes with many responsibilities, not the least of which is telling bedtime stories. It may be a while before your little boy begins asking for stories, but that time will arrive before you know it.