Memories of growing up on the farm

Laurel’s work-roughened hands grabbed the twine on the top of the newly baled hay. The rough grass of the swamp was sharp on her hands. The newly baled hay smelled so nice in the hot air of early fall. She pulled the bale up to her knee and walked holding the bale. Gripping the twine and balancing it on the top of her thigh she walked to the hayrack parked nearby. The two blond children on the rack reached for the bale with outstretched hands and tugged it up onto the rack. The children then together hoisted the bales up and arranged them in rows and layers. So they had to crawl up a bale tug another up to place on the top. All three were sweating from the excretion of their efforts.
Jesse the children’s stepfather and Laurel’s husband was baling hay in a boggy area that was much wetter then had been expected. Jesse had unhitched the wagon because he couldn’t pull the wagon in there it would have been too much weight for the boggy soil. As the area was cleaned of bales the girl Sandi jumped down from the wagon and climbed the little Case tractor and drove the wagon to the next bunch of bales. The damp of the area plus the heavy grass had made weight of these bales run close to one hundred pounds apiece. It was hard exhausting work for the family, made harder by the unseasonably warm day.
Laurel brought another bale to the wagon grunting as she hoisted it up past her huge belly and the kids pulled it on to the bed of the wagon. The wagon was about half full and the field still had quite a few bales to go. This was the third wagonload they had done today. Laurel rested against the wagon her face reddened from her effort. She had sweat running down her face. The front of her blouse was wet, from the sweat and damp bales. The efforts of this work, shown heavily in the tired expression of her face, and in the slumped, weary way she walked.
“Sandi, tell your Dad I have gone home I can’t do any more! You kids finish up picking up the bales for Dad! ” The children looked at each other frowning but nodded and watched for a minute as she turned toward the west and walked home. The children jumped down and began pulling the bales toward the wagon taking care not to dislodge the twine and make the bale fall apart.

This is a true story. My mother delivered twin girls two weeks later, one month premature.