About a decade ago, when my wife and I had just started dating; I would make the long drive to spend the weekend with her family. She lived on a small country farm atop a hill over looking a HUGE hay meadow and cow pasture. Just acres & acres of rolling hills and country side. At the back of the property in a small home lived her Grandfather. I would stay with him on the weekends that I was there. Normally drive up on a Friday evening, go out for dinner with my sweetheart and then back to her house. Often times we would sit on the swing and talk about our hopes and dreams, then other times we would gather with her family and play a game together. Saturday mornings her dad would have planned out chores for the family to do before we could go off and do our thing, Normally the chores included house work, or outside chores like weeding the garden and such. One Friday around lunch time, Joy (my wife) called me, said that she had alot to get done the next day around the house, and didnt want to bore me so if I didnt have to come over that weekend. I just wanted to spend time with her, it had already five (5) whole days since I had seen her and felt like a century. :-) I asked if she mind if I just came on over, I would even help do whatever. Man, was I in for a surprise the next morning. I woke up, hurried to her house for her mom had prepared the usual Saturday morning breakfast of eggs, bacon/sausage, biscuits and gravy. During breakfast her dat told her that she needed to spread that huge pile of horse manure throughout the garden before we left for the day. He planned to start plowing and needed it done before he could start. I sat in silence, waiting to see her reaction. She tried to talk her dat out of it, but no, it had to be done. I told her, I was a country boy and would help her out. :-)
After we finished our breakfast, I changed into some old clothes and to the garden we went. The pile of manure was huge, moist, and yes smelled something awful. We grabbed our shovels and started filling the buckets. One by one we would scatter the buckets of manure around the garden. Sometime later, as we both started sweating, and getting tired we decided to make it more fun.... Joy took a shovel of manure and flung it at me, hitting me in the face, I was stunned for a moment, then started laughing.. It was all over after that. We grabbed buckets, handfuls, and shovel fulls of manure and chased each other around the garden.. Before we knew it, the pile was nearly all gone, and by that time she and I were covered in manure.. I told her to go ahead and go inside to get a shower, while I finished the work.
I always wondered if this was a tactic of her dat's to scare me off, or see if I would stick around. Will not ever really know, but what I do know is that we had a blast that day. We made memories, and the best of a stinky situation. All this got me to thinking, sometimes we have those days when it seems we are surrounded by manure. There is nothing you can do to change the situation, or to avoid doing that "chore." What does matter is how you handle that situation. You can either let it whip you, and tear you down, or you can take it in stride and enjoy life. Know that God is in control and everything will turn out just fine..
Thanks for reading, and until next time, God Bless!!
Jesse Adams, Blogger
The Plain Truth
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