Memories From A Semi-Farm Kid

By Matt Stafford

Spring in rural Kentucky brings many pleasant thoughts to mind. For me, it triggers the official start of the outdoor season. Don’t get me wrong — I enjoy the occasional deer hunt in the winter when a fresh blanket of snow covers the ground, but I’d rather take in nature on a sunny day with warmer temperatures. In particular, this time of year signals the fishing and turkey hunting seasons. There’s nothing I enjoy more on a day off from work than casting lines over a farm pond or coaxing thundering gobblers into decoys on a chilly morning. For many other Owen Countians, however, spring is the cue for the planting season.

The rolling hills my father once planted tobacco on are now covered in giant ironweeds and sagegrass. That piece of ground no longer produces the green leaf that has long been associated with the state and county. Instead, Dad sold it when he realized the difficulty of striving to profit from producing just a few acres of the crop and spending too much time away from his family in doing so. After that transaction occurred, my twin brother, Mike, and I were thankfully given permission to continue hunting the same ground where we had acquired the skill to do so. Most of the memories I hold dear from that small 28-acre tract consist of chasing squirrels and waiting on whitetails, but there are some within the depths of my mind that involve my earlier years. It was a time when Dad was still very active on the farm, spending long hours setting, weeding, topping, cutting, hanging, and stripping

tobacco.

I was once referred to by a now-deceased old family friend as a “semi-farm kid.” I’ll never forget that. It seemed like an accurate description. Growing up in Owen County, I would venture to say that most folks have some sense of connection to our history of agriculture, no matter how distant it may be. My brother and I were fortunate. My father, mother, and sister weren’t so much. As a matter of fact, I’ll tell you that my sister, 8 years my senior, spent much more time sweating in those patches than my brother and I ever did. Mike and I were both very young, with relatively severe cases of asthma and allergies. We both remember times when we had the privilege of setting tobacco or following the setter, and I’m sure we thought we were big stuff at the time. And while we may have thought we contributed by hoeing out the weeds in between the stalks, I dare say that our support was, by and large, unneeded. Mom would take us out to the farm to visit Dad during a break he’d take to talk or take us on a ride on the tractor. I vividly remember how my father would sit atop that old Massey Ferguson. Once aboard, he’d stand and hike his jeans up before sitting down and pushing the green Farm Credit trucker hat far atop his head, where it would hang on for dear life. Mom would take us for quick trips to the farm, where a walk into the barn under hanging tobacco or a visit inside a cozy stripping room kept warm with a space heater would trigger my asthma with the dust.

In recent years, and especially since I became a father, I’ve realized the sacrifices my family members made during that time. Dad had multiple jobs. Raising a crop wasn’t even his full-time profession. It was the job after the job. Mom was going back to school, and the task was made even more difficult by two toddlers crawling over her and the attention needed by a growing young daughter. My recollections from these years on the farm are snippets: tractor rides, collecting soil samples, dropping tobacco stalks after the harvest from a wagon, and playing with my brother in the fields or the barn. There was one occasion when we’d picked up sandwiches from MeadowView for a picnic in the far corner of the property. Our path was almost identical to the one I take now to my deer blind. I was walking with my little hand holding onto the giant one that belonged to my father when suddenly we noticed a large black racer snake slithering quickly toward me. My dad quickly jerked me up with one hand, and as I went airborne, I glanced below to notice the serpent sneak right in between where my two little legs would have been. It was the first time in my life I’d been flying. Maybe that’s the origin of my love for aviation. For my brother and me, these little treasures are the occasions we recall. I'm sure my father, mother, and sister’s memories probably aren’t nearly as pleasant. Long, hot, toiling hours away from home aren’t ideal for any family, but many families throughout the county didn’t have a choice. The back-breaking work of the harvest of tobacco, corn, soybeans, etc., helped ensure no mouths went hungry. I know now why they did it, and I’m forever thankful for the sacrifices, the literal blood, sweat, and tears shed in tobacco patches to ensure that I would grow up not aware of what it was like to do the same.

Mike and I had a few stints spent helping friends and neighbors on their farms, but nothing compared to most folks who grow up knowing nothing else. It took me one time loading square bales to learn I needed long sleeves for the second time. Only one single instance of weed-eating at a farm pond as a boy was needed before I understood the importance of a mask to avoid an Albuterol breathing treatment at the emergency room. To this day, if you spot me weed-eating my lawn, I’ll have a mask on. An instance that occurred in the last couple of years helped solidify how poor of a full-blown farm kid I would have been. My father-in-law had plans to build himself a hoop barn on his cattle farm to store farm machinery and old cars and had all the metal tubing he needed, but he had previously laid out all these pieces in a thick patch of ragweed on his property. He’d asked if I could help him and my mother-in-law drag these pieces out in preparation for the assembly. Of course, I was happy to oblige … until I saw the field of grown-up weeds the tubes were hidden in. Knowing there wasn’t any possible way I would back out of helping him, I prepared myself for the bodily reaction that was sure to come and went to work anyway. One by one, I’d dig in those weeds until I’d find the tubes, hook up the chains, and wait for my father-in-law to pull them out with his tractor. It didn’t take long before my entire face was leaking, my shirt covered in my own snot, and the afternoon air filled with ragweed dust and the pleasant sounds of Matt sneezing and coughing up a lung. I believe that’s when my father-in-law realized why I chose to work in a steel mill. A hot shower, a couple of doses of Benadryl, and a few puffs of the inhaler- I was good as new.

Even now, after many years spent playing and hunting on this piece of ground, one memory stands out above the rest. Dad was busy at the farm while I was playing in a little league baseball game at the fairgrounds. Mike called the game from the booth above the field while Mom nervously watched on the bleachers. If my memory is correct, our team was facing the best team in our league, filled with hotshot ballplayers who were far better than I ever dreamed of being. I never was much of an athlete. Our team was down by 1 in the bottom of the final inning with bases loaded, 2 outs, and yours truly up to bat. Coach Dan Logan gave me a little pep talk before I made my way to the plate. After nodding in anxious affirmation to his words of encouragement, I walked to the plate and awaited the ball to be delivered to me from the pitching machine. Wouldn’t you know it, little ol' unathletic me hits a line drive in between first and second to the outfield, and before my little legs had scurried toward second base after rounding first, I was picked up by coach and carried off the field in celebration of our unlikely win. Coach Logan had signed and dated the game ball for me, and I could not wait to show it proudly to Dad. The first thing we did was drive out to the farm. Dad has told me he still remembers me running through the rows over the tobacco plants to show him my trophy. That was the final straw for him. He couldn’t take missing these events anymore; after this instance, he never missed another. He sold the farm the next year.

I’ll never forget my experiences at the place I still call “the farm,” even though we haven’t owned it in some time. What I witnessed there still has a profound effect on my life. Seeing my family sacrifice their time to work the ground so I wouldn’t have to has made me a more appreciative son and, hopefully, a better father. Watching the long-gone practice of work-sharing helps to remind me to practice the Christian principle of treating your neighbor as yourself. In writing these warm memories, I’m humbled to know it is because of the work of the ones I love that I don’t have any bad ones, and I’m forever indebted to them. I would have made a poor farmer, but my hat is tipped to those who do it daily to keep food on their table and mine literally. I pray that I honor the sacrifices made before me by working so that the ones I leave behind will have to work less than I did.