Career Suicide

I have committed the unspeakable act of career suicide. There are those who would say I was guilty of flushing my career down the proverbial toilet. After all, I didn't get paid for my career, so therefore I wasn't legitimately occupied. I didn't "punch a clock" or work for the state. My resume would read as follows: home-schooled my children from birth through high school (3 out of 4, anyway--one currently in public high school). That's it! (well, not exactly). I did teach 3rd and 4th grades for a year before we began our own family, owned my own daycare, farm and real estate appraisal business with my husband. That is roughly 219,000 hours and counting of unpaid work, round the clock, no sick days or paid time off--HA!!! No pension, no promotions, no fame or fortune. Zippo.

If I could go back and do it all over, would I change anything? Perhaps. How do you finish a 26-year marathon then look back and not see how you couldn't have done some things better? Of course I could in a perfect world. In a perfect world, I would've taught my children with unlimited resources of time and money with never a worry of any lack. Obviously, this was never my reality, in the natural. By that, I mean apart from God's provision, there was no WAY I could have accomplished what I did those many, many, MANY hours, days, months, seasons, years. NO way--impossible! Did I ever want to quit? Absolutely! Ever get discouraged? Every day. Ever doubt the outcome of my work? Too many times. Worry unnecessarily? OH did I ever.

I was just stubborn enough to believe that if God called our family to do this, He would have to make a way. And He did! Boy, did He ever!! My sons both went on to achieve top honors in their programs in their post-secondary education, our youngest now in public high school getting all A's (a B+ in P.E. to her chagrin), and our other daughter and her husband now owning their own farm and raising their own family. My husband supported me all the way all those years. If it weren't for him having our own business, I'm not sure we would have home-schooled as long as we did. Somehow God made it possible to make a one-income household thrive. Together, we worked hard, played hard, and prayed often. My advice to families today is this: eat meals together every day, whenever possible. This is the best way to talk about your day, solve the world's problems, and talk about future vacations, goals, and dreams. And always, ALWAYS spend time together in God's Word and pray!


More important than any achievements the world may deem to be "successful" is that each one of our children is living for Jesus. Nothing else would matter one crumb if they didn't love the Lord with their whole hearts. Nothing. I am not saying that home-schooling is the answer, and no matter where your children attend school, the time you spend with your children (and I mean actively involved) is never, ever wasted! People now ask me if I will go back into teaching, and I almost always say "no". But really I never have quit teaching, and since I'm used to doing it without pay, I may as well continue. Career suicide? Depends on who you ask.

Factory Farm Field Day

Field trip today with our home school co-op at the largest dairy farm I've ever been to.  Now, you have to realize that we live smack in the middle of dairy farm country, surrounded by the old order Amish with their primitive horse-drawn buggies, to the Mennonites, a few centuries more modern than the Amish, all the way up to the 21st century state-of-the-art factory farm:  THE farm of the future.

I have to say that I have somewhat of a prejudice of these oversized megafarms, mainly because we are former owner/operators of a comparatively midget-sized family dairy farm, which now has been downsized to a one cow/one calf hobby farm.  Laughable to even call ours a farm, and I don't even want to mention that fact to the owner of this megalopolis just 12 miles from our acreage, or he'd likely laugh us off his place.  But even though I have a small-farm preference, I go with an open mind and grateful for the chance to see the wave of the future in dairy farm technology.

After a short zigzaggy drive through muddy, slushy, potholey, sloppy excuses for roads, we survive the trek to arrive at a sparkling monument of a barn that makes me sit up and take notice--hmmmmm, are they making some money here, or what?  Not what I'm used to with our experience in farming, where the money coming in goes out even faster...well, I think to myself, the bank is their best friend, no doubt.  Okay, my judgement may not be fair, so I try to make myself be open to something new.  We're greeted by Kim, our tour guide and the nutritionist who the farm has hired to manage the rations for this 2500 some head of cattle owned by this "factory farm".

Kim, beaming with joy at all the people who have come to learn from her expertise in all things bovine, greets us with pairs of plastic booties to put on over our shoes.  I think to myself, "I should have these for folks that come over this time of year, with all the mud and junk...", then I realize my own family'd never fall for that, so I file it away in my mind under "useless information".  Kim takes us all through a heated part of the "barn", into an unheated open area where all the cows and calves are neatly penned off into their own specialized areas.  First to our right are the newborn baby calves, still wet from birth and lying comfortably in clean straw--awww, so cute and innocent looking.  To our left is a huge open area with all kinds of holsteins, who are as curious to see what we're doing as we are of them.

My daughter is of course familiar with cows, since we live surrounded by them, so I concentrate on watching my city-slicker friends' kids reactions to the animals.  The kids seem to really enjoy watching the cows from a comfortable distance, and it's funny when I hear some of them saying how bad it smells.  Boy, I was thinking it smelled pretty good considering how many cows were in one big confined area, but I guess I'm just used to the smell.  As some farmer friends of mine like to say, "Smells like money to me!", although I know better than that.  If money smelled like that, everyone would be a farmer...hmmmm....    (to be continued)