Sounds of The Windy Knoll for a non-resident.

Guest writer, Donna Crumly Harvey

While attempting to be an asset to the Windy Knoll resident’s during the re-cooperation of your favorite blogger, I am the older sister and writing is not my forte.  I am however, the current caretaker of the Windy Knoll and am desperately trying to hold it together.  No one ever does exactly like the resident but we seem to be managing.  I am sleeping in the room where, I remember as a child sleeping on the sofa on a visit from Georgia.  This is the room where Mother has written about the resident ghost closing  the door when her friend spent the night.  I do not seem to be bothered at all by the ghost or I just go to sleep and let the happenings happen.  Either way, I awaken in the morning as I stumble to the lavatory I run into Daddy.  He said he was up and realized he had forgotten his hearing aids and then I saw he did not have on his glasses.  That would cut down on the sound for sure.  Then I hear the door alert buzz and I know the cats are being welcomed for their morning feeding.

Animals are a vital part of this environment.  As I move to the computer to telecommute to my work, I hear from the pasture the blatting or bawling of a cow. I am not sure what the sound is called but I believe the mother cow is calling for her baby who has been carried to the sale barn.  Daddy was telling me that this young bull was so mean that he would not even get in the lot with him.
The television is a modern invention, at least in my lifetime.  It keeps us up to date with the rain that has been such a welcome relief.  The garden has had some new planting and those little seed and new plants need the water to grow.  I hear the door again and hear the words, “If you feel like  it, can you bring me a glass of water?”  This is out of the ordinary and I immediately get the water and see that Daddy is sweating like “whatever you would say here!”  I ask what he has been doing and discover he tells me he has dug the entire row of onions which need to be dried and stored to once again plant in the fall.  Daddy always has the best little green onions that multiply and the tops make terrific chives in recipes.  It has been hot and at the age of 89 pushing 90 I cannot believe he does not know how to pace himself.  But he said he just wanted to get it all done.  I thought he should have done half the row today and half tomorrow.
I get settled back and hear a call that I have to see Sister keeping the calf in the fence.  Sister is just a country dog and who knows what kind, but she is a love at the farm too.

When she was a puppy I would not pet her unless she would sit down, because I don’t like to be jumped on.  To this day when she comes up to me she will sit down and I pet her.  She does indeed have intelligence because as she lay outside the barbed wire fence by the calf, if the calf chose to eat outside the fence, Sister would move toward the calf a little and it would move back.  Eventually the calf just smelled of Sister and she made no effort toward the calf.  Sister only moved when she hears the farm master (daddy) exit the back door.   So I am settled once again for a while and now I hear noises coming from the kitchen and some mumbling going on.  Getting up to check, I find the farm master has chosen to investigate the fallout shelter (freezer section of the side by side fridge), and when I ask what he is doing in the fallout shelter, he says he is searching for hamburger buns.  I knew where they were and solved that issue.  As you can see from the various encounters, County Living is missing its Matriarch.  Cards for her can be mailed to mother, Mrs. Billie Crumly, P.O Box 281, Geraldine, AL.