Chapter 29
Starting my day by awakening with Mai-Lin in bed with me was something of a shock, but it was really nothing compared to what happened later. Having Mai-Lin and Fran take me into the new bathroom and give me a sponge bath after breakfast topped that. That was especially true when Fran said that Mai-Lin might like to take care of the 'lower forty', which seemed to mean anything lower than the bandages around my belly.
Of course they stripped me naked and having the two of them chattering away in Chinese while they giggled like school girls didn't help my embarrassment a bit. Then they totally blew my mind when Fran suggested that she could instruct Mai-Lin on what she considered to be the proper way to give a blow job. Mai-Lin was on her knees instntly, but I stopped her as her hand reached out to guide my cock toward her mouth, explaining that I simply wasn't healed enough to take it. Fran tried to argue with me, but I was stubborn, and to my surprise she gave in.
After the sponge bath was completed to Fran's satisfaction, I felt chilled and wiped out from standing around naked. So once they had changed my bandages, and had helped me back into bed, I dozed off for a while.
I awoke to the smell of fresh coffee and the feel of warm fur against one arm. When I opened my eyes, I found that Princess, the cat was snuggled on top of the blankets at my side. Fran was smiling at me as she held a cup of coffee near my face.
"I thought the smell of fresh coffee might wake you." She said quietly, still smiling. "The boys would like to talk to you, and so would Mai-Lin and I. We could all come in here if you don't feel like getting up."
"I'd better get up, but I don't know about getting dressed." I sighed.
"Just pull on your bathrobe and some slippers." Fran suggested quietly. "After all, we've been keeping the house quite warm and no one is going to be offended if you aren't dressed to go outside. We don't want you to do any physical work. We just want to pick your brain about what you have planned to do in the way of planting this year and anything else you were planning to get done right away."
"Oh, okay. Then I think I'd like to try to get up. Why don't you take the coffee back to the kitchen and we can all sit at the table?"
"Do you need a hand with anything?" She asked quietly as she handed me the robe and slippers.
"If I do, I'll call, okay?" I managed a smile, even though I was planning on doing everything I could by myself rather than depending on others.
"Well, don't strain yourself." She said quite sharply, but she did leave.
Even though the cat protested about being moved, I managed to squirm out of bed and into my robe and slippers without feeling any major discomfort. In fact I didn't feel any major pain as I got up, went to the bathroom, then out to the kitchen.
I was surprised that not only were David and Sampson waiting for me there, but so were Willy and Triple Dub. After greeting everyone and sitting down at the table, I asked what they wanted to know. That's when I found that they'd been rebuilding darn near every piece of farm equipment in the equipment shed and a few that had been sitting outside. At least that's what it seemed to me as they explained all the things they'd worked on. What they really wanted that day was an idea of what I wanted to plant in the spring and where I wanted to plant it. They felt that if they knew that, then they could be sure to have the right equipment ready to use when it was needed.
Planning what to plant called for a map of the fields, I asked for a paper and pencil so I could sketch out the various areas and estimate their size. Instead, Triple Dub just grinned and handed me several sheets of paper. He and Willy had gone out with their snowmobiles and a long rope, and had measured all the various fields, then had plotted them all on a map of the farm. Since Willy and his dad could remember what Uncle Silas had planted in each field last year and since Triple Dub had worked out all the acreages; all I needed to do was work out what I wanted to plant in the spring. Since I already had the seed on order, I told them I'd have to find the order to work out the details, but Fran and Mai-Lin were already ahead of me there as well. They'd helped Lisa-Marie set up my new filing cabinet and that morning they'd pulled the proper file folder so Mai-Lin could hand it to me when I needed it.
I said I still needed a pencil and paper, but Mai-Lin had that in front of me in a second. Then as I started to work out what I was going to be able to plant in which field, she checked all my figures on an abacus, often doing sums faster than I could multiply the totals myself.
She did question why I was planting oats as well as either clover or alfalfa in some of the same fields, so I explained that I was planting oats as a cover crop for the two legume crops. The oats would either be cut as greenfeed for my cattle and horses, or harvested as a regular crop. If I didn't till those fields in the fall, then next year I could plan on cutting and baling clover and alfalfa hay as a cash crop or as additional feed for my own stock.
Of course I also had to explain that if clover or alfalfa had been inoculated with the right bacteria before it was planted, it then fixed nitrogen from the air and transferred it into the soil. Since that lessened the need for chemical fertilizers, I wanted to eventually treat all of my fields that way as I worked out a complete rotation system. Once I'd established a rotation throughout all of the fields, I planned on reducing the use of chemicals in every way I could.
Of course that's also when I threw them a curve, mentioning that I planned to buy a manure spreader at an auction during the summer. That way, next winter I could spread the fresh manure from the animals onto the fields while the ground was frozen, explaining that I'd use it only on the fields that weren't being used for growing legumes.
"Hey, there's an old manure spreader sitting in a shed over at Gran's place." Triple Dub said as he jumped to his feet. "Uncle Fred has a new one, so I'll bet you could buy the old one from him darn cheap. It might need some repairs though. Could I use your phone and find out if he'd sell it?"
"Hey, if you bought that, we could fix it and get a head start on spreading the manure this year. We can clean up that big manure pile out behind your barn." Willy smiled as Triple Dub was dialling the phone.
"Well, part of that pile maybe, but some of that pile is two or three years old." I frowned. "I want to save some of that oldest stuff for our garden and few more loads for Mai-Lin's garden patch. Which reminds me, I need to find someone with a plow and a tractor-mounted rototiller."
"And what do you need that for?" Fran asked.
"Well, Mai-Lin's acreage is covered in grass and weeds because Uncle Silas didn't bother farming it the last couple of years. Instead he threw some grass seed on it, then just left it to grow in. He was planning to cut it for hay when it grew in heavily enough. The sod needs to be turned under, then the soil needs to be rototilled to loosen it up before Mai-Lin can plant it. If we can get a manure spreader we can turn the manure into the soil at the same time as we plow it."
"You can't use your tractor for either a three-point hitch plow or a rototiller. It doesn't have a place to attach a three-point hitch." David said flatly. "We've got a little old Ford tractor that does and we've got a two-bottom plow to go with it."
"I have rototiller, a big one." Mai-Lin said quietly. "Papa bought it for use at our home, but he uses it little."
"A big one?"
"Oh, yes, not a little one, not like you rent. It is one of the big ones that has the chewing teeth at the back. It has tires, so tall, like little tractor tires." She gestured, dropping one hand to the height of her knee. "Papa paid many dollars for it, but it does our whole garden very fast, then it sits unused for months. It is not hard to use; I have used it many times, so I can use it again."
"Are you sure?"
"Oh yes. If you plow the manure into the ground with a tractor, then I and my family can do the rest." She nodded enthusiastically. "Even the supply of the manure is a wonderful surprise."
Just then Triple Dub came back and sighed loudly, interrupting Mai-Lin.
"What's up?" I asked him, breaking the sudden silence.
"Oh, Uncle Fred is being an ass again." He sighed once more. "He said he'd sell you the manure spreader, but you've got to take all the other old machinery on the place too. He wants five grand for the lot and says it's all or nothing."
"I think you can buy a darn good used manure spreader for that much." Willy laughed. "I guess he doesn't want to sell it that badly."
"That's just it, he said he wants to sell everything he can and then bulldoze the barn and the sheds and the house, so he can farm the whole lot." Triple Dub sounded frustrated. "That P's me off because Granny Nettie's house is still in darn good shape."
"Say! I just had a wild idea." I chuckled. "How big is that house?"
"It's about eighteen or twenty feet wide and about thirty-five or forty feet long. Why do you ask?" Triple Dub frowned at me.
"Is it a single storey house?"
"Yeah, it's really a two-bedroom cottage."
"So it's small enough to be moved easily?"
"Yeah, but you don't need another house."
"Mai-Lin does." I grinned.
"Oh, but how much would it cost to move a house?" Mai-Lin said, looking at me wide eyed.
"Probably a lot less than buying a decent sized trailer and moving it all the way out here." I grinned at her.
"That house isn't that old either, I know it was built after the Grangers had a fire in the kitchen of their old house." Willy frowned. "Fred is nuts to even think of knocking it down."
"It was built in 1966; the same year I was born." Triple Dub said flatly. "It was built well too, because Dad built it, and he was a good carpenter. It's fully insulated and everything. Heck, at one time I was thinking of moving into it and living there, but I need to be in town because of my business."
"So who owns the property?" Fran asked quietly.
"Oh, since Gran died, I guess Mom does. Well actually, from what the will said, Mom and I do, but Mom gets the profit from renting it for now."
"And that would mean that Fred would need your mother's and your permission to knock down the buildings doesn't it?"
"Well, yeah, I guess it does. Hey, I guess Uncle Fred doesn't own that dang manure spreader. I guess maybe I own the darn thing." He laughed and slapped his leg, then he jumped to his feet again. "Just a minute, I've gotta phone Mom before Uncle Fred does."
As he ran back to the phone, Mai-Lin looked at me strangely.
"If you were me, you would buy a house, not a trailer?" She said quietly.
"If I were you and had the chance to buy a small house that was as easy to move as that one would be, I'd buy it in a minute." David answered her before I could. "Have you ever been in a house trailer in the winter? If not, I can tell you, they're cold, draughty and hard to heat."
"Well, I may have jumped the gun on the idea. After all, Triple Dub and his mom may decide not to sell the house." I shrugged my shoulders. "But before we get carried away, are there any more questions about machinery?"
"Yeah, we do." Samson grinned. "We thought you'd need the cultivator, the seed drill and the harrows, but we weren't sure what else."
"Okay, that's a good start." I nodded. "The front end loader needs to come off the tractor, but I think that can stay on for now, because of the manure spreading. Even with the loader off, we'll still need the cab though. You said that you've gone over the tractor from top to bottom?"
"Yep, it's in prime shape." He nodded.
"Okay, we'll need the Chevy two ton in good running order and we'll need to make sure all the augers and things of that sort are readied for handling seed grain. The cultivator needs the spike points taken off and wide shovels put on. The old seed drill is in really rough shape, I'm hoping it can be fixed. I wanted to plow under that field of broom grass and plant that to oats and alfalfa, but that would mean fixing both the old four bottom plow and the disks. Maybe I'll turn that field under later this summer, because I'm going to be short of time."
"How about the one way disk? Do you want it fixed up and readied?"
"No, not actually, I may get rid of that thing. I'd much rather have some Noble Blades."
"Noble Blades, just what are they?" Willy asked.
"Oh, each one is a cultivator of sorts, but instead of many blades, it only has one, but that blade is as much as eight feet wide. They're almost always pulled in tandem from a central hitch. I think the John Deere could manage two or perhaps even three of those in this sandy soil."
"So they don't turn the stubble under?" He asked again.
"No, that's the whole thing. The idea is to loosen the soil in the field, but leave the stubble from the last crop on the surface to catch the drifting snow. That lessens wind erosion and still opens up the soil to admit what moisture we do get."
"That sounds like a darn good idea." He nodded. "I've seen winter winds and Chinooks blow a lot of soil from some of our fields. Having the stubble left to protect it and yet having the soil loose enough that moisture doesn't puddle and run off easily makes sense."
"Unh huh." I just nodded, still thinking about machinery. "The only other thing I can think that I might need this spring would be a rod weeder and that's a huge maybe."
"That gives the boys lots to go on for now and you're looking tired, Tom." Fran said at that point. "Why don't you go lie down and if you need to, you can talk to them at coffee time this afternoon?"
Strangely I was tired, even though I'd only been talking, but I didn't argue with her. Instead I went back to bed and read a bit, then dozed for a few hours. Fran bought me lunch, but I went back to sleep afterward. Mai-Lin came in to wake me at just before three in the afternoon.
"I am sorry to waken you, Big Tom, but Triple Dub and my family are here and would like to speak with you." She apologized.
"Triple Dub and your family?"
"Yes, William and his mother are willing to sell us the house from their farm and as well he has some other things he wishes to speak with you about; as do Mama and Papa."
"Okay, could you put on the coffee pot, please and make tea for your parents too, if they'd prefer that." I sat up. "I'll be there as soon as I've made it to the bathroom and washed my face."
She just smiled, then almost seemed to bow before she left. I rolled out of bed and as I was putting on the robe, I realized that I felt better than I had in days. I was actually walking quite freely when I went to sit down at the kitchen table, joining Mama Tang and her husband, Han Tang, who were already sitting with Triple Dub and Fran. Mai-Lin stood at her mother's side, but as soon as I sat down, she moved to get me a mug of coffee.
"Okay, what's up?" I asked as soon as greetings were done.
"Mai-Lin phone us earlier and we talk to Mr. William and to house movers. Is okay to move house to Mai-Lin's little farm place, even if she just renting?" Mama Tang asked instantly.
"Sure. Why not?" I shrugged my shoulders.
"You own land and maybe so Mai-Lin's garden farm not work out." Papa Tang spoke quietly. "Then we have house on your farm that you not want and not want to pay for. We lose money."
"Oh no." I laughed. "I wouldn't do that to you. Would you rather that I bought the house and charged Mai-Lin rent for it as well as for the land?"
"Oh no, please. We like to buy house, move to little farm, then if Mai-Lin not successful at business, maybe so, you buy?" He continued. "If so, we sell to you at our cost if you say okay to move it there now."
"Sure. We could do that." I nodded. "I guess we'll need to have a lawyer draw up a lease agreement anyway, and we can cover that in the document, so that's no problem."
"Then Mr. William, we buy house." Mama Tang grinned at Triple Dub and held out her right hand. "And Mr. Big Tom, we just need hand shake, not need lawyer, too much cost for him put in his pocket. We trust you big time already."
"Hey, how come I'm suddenly Mr. Big Tom?" I grinned.
"Well, now you are my landlord." Mai-Lin giggled. "Now I must treat you much nicer and be careful not to offend you in any way."
Papa Tang said something in Chinese that made Mai-Lin blush while both Fran and Mama Tang laughed openly. I looked at him and frowned slightly.
"I don't understand Chinese." I said quietly, looking him in the eye.
"Sorry, I tell oldest daughter old Chinese saying; makes sense in Chinese, but not translate so good: 'Young landlord like good food, woman enjoy cooking and helping make young landlord happy too much, get fat.' got lotsa different meaning." He laughed and Mai-Lin actually hid her face in embarrassment.
"Okay, enough of that." I sighed and rolled my eyes, then turned to Triple Dub. "Now, Fran said you wanted to talk to me too. I suppose it's about that manure spreader, is it?"
"Well, it's there, but there's a lot of other equipment too. Willy and I wandered around while we were waiting for the Tangs to come out from Olds to look at the house and we found a lot of useful stuff that Grandad had stored away under cover. I really don't want Uncle Fred to get his money-grubbing hands on it."
"Oh, troubles on the family front?"
"Yeah, that's putting it mildly." Triple Dub snorted. "After talking to you this morning, I drove home and looked at the lease that Uncle Fred had with Gran. To put it mildly, he was ripping her off. So I phoned him to say that the lease would have to be renegotiated and he blew his cork. I don't know what he was thinking though. I mean he hadn't even renegotiated the old lease with Gran and it ran out on New Year's eve. Mom got on the phone then and told him she was looking for someone else to lease or rent the place."
"Oh boy." I sighed, instantly assuming that he was planning to ask me if I wanted to lease the farm and knowing that I wasn't ready to expand at this point in time.
"We thought of you right away, but I know that right now you're still new to this farm and this area. Besides, you're still recovering from surgery, so I thought you'd probably turn me down. I mentioned that to Willy while we were wandering around the farmstead with his dad and we came up with a different idea." He took a deep breath and straightened up as if he was nerving himself to tackle a tough task. "Willy and I were wondering if you'd be interested in going into partnership with him to farm the place?"
"What?" I stared at him. "Won't Willy's dad be a bit put out about that? And what about Willy and Jean? I mean her dad is the one you're arguing with; won't he be upset with Willy and Jean too?"
"Well, in the first place, Willy's dad was there. Actually, Bill was the one who suggested the idea. I don't know about Jean, but if I was her, I'd be all for it. If you and Willy were partners in renting that farm, then he'd be in a lot better financial shape than he is now. Heck, there's four hundred acres of grazing land there, and more than five hundred acres of tilled land. The place covers a section and a half, you know. Not only that, but it backs right up to the quarter section that was willed to Jean by her grandfather, so along with her land that would be a section and three quarters."
"Holy Crap, I didn't think we were talking about anything nearly that large. That's as big as what we are farming here. I'll tell you right now that I'd like to think about it, but I'd have to talk to Lisa-Marie and Willy, probably Jean too. Even considering the fact that a lot of it is grazing land, that much land probably means two and a half times the amount of work."
"Oh, I know that, and I know Lisa-Marie won't be back home until tomorrow night at the earliest. To be honest though, I'd like to get moving on this fairly quickly. However, no matter what happens, I'd like to get a lot of that machinery and equipment out of there as soon as possible. I'm really worried that Uncle Fred might get his mitts on it somehow."
"Well, you can store machinery here, I suppose, but it might have to be outside."
"That would work for most of it." Triple Dub sighed. "Uncle Fred's up to his ears in lambing right now anyway, so I think we've got a few days. The only thing is, I'd like to get the two tractors up here and inside if I could."
"You've got two tractors? What are they?"
"Oh, there's a John Deere 820 diesel and a little Ford tractor; I think Grandad called that a Dexta or something. Anyway, it has a three-point hitch and there's a plow for it, but I don't think he had a rototiller attachment." He shrugged his shoulders. "There is a little double disk for it though."
"Wow, and these were all stored inside a shed?"
"Oh yeah, that's another thing. They're stored in a metal shed, sort of like a Quonset hut. Dad must have just driven them in there, parked them and locked the doors when Grandad died. Heck, the tractors even have the old fuel still in the fuel tanks."
"How long have they been sitting there?"
"Oh, a little more than five years." He sighed. "I don't think Uncle Fred had the keys to the house and the keys to the metal shed were inside it. Heck, he might not even know that the tractors are there."
"Well, I'd just lock that shed for now and worry about what was inside there later. I think the engines on those tractors would need to be gone over before they could be moved anyway. The tires and any rubber seals will probably be shot too."
"Well, that's what we thought, but I wanted to tell you about them because you were talking about plowing and rototilling Mai-Lin's place." Triple Dub sighed.
"We can do rototiller. I have big one, made in US of A by Troy." Papa Tang said insistently. "You show my son, Chan, how to run tractor and plow, he do that too. No need you do job."
"Does he have a lot of experience at driving a farm tractor?" I asked.
"No, neva before, but he learn fast."
"Well, I'm sorry then, but it takes a while to learn how to use a plow right. Plowing is one job that has to be done right the first time, because you don't get a second chance." I grinned and shook my head. "If you don't do a good job, it creates a real problem. Then you have unturned sods that can cause problems for the rototiller and even for the gardener long after the rototiller is done."
"I do not understand. Why would this cause a problem for gardener?" Mai-Lin asked.
"Well, if the plowing is done properly, soil is rolled completely over and lands upside down. That puts the sod and weeds on the bottom where they can rot and relatively clean soil is brought to the top."
"Ahh, I see!" She smiled. "If poor job done, you have much more weeds."
"Yes, and since the soil there hasn't been used for a garden before, you're going to have a lot of those anyway." Fran grinned at her. "I don't think you realize how big five acres will seem to be, not until you're out there trying to weed it all."
"She has brothers and sisters who will help her." Papa Tang said flatly, then his gaze shifted from Fran to me. "My daughter says you do this plowing and provide cattle dung for fertilizer too. What do you charge for this, please?"
"No additional charge." I grinned. "Consider it part of her wages for helping out while I'm sick."
"That is not fair to you, Big Tom." Mai-Lin protested instantly. "I am here as a friend, just to help when you need it."
"Ah, but you're earning it, whether you agree or not." I grinned at her. "I consider it an even swap of favours."
That led to a discussion that carried on for several minutes, but was broken up when Willy appeared at the door. He surprised us all by bringing Jean along with him. We'd hardly greeted them when the phone rang and Fran glanced at her watch, then told me that it'd be for me. As soon as I picked up the receiver, I was certain that the call had been set up previously because it was Lisa-Marie.
"Hi Tom. I've missed you. How are you feeling now?"
"I'm okay. Well, actually I'm getting there, but I've been sleeping more at home than I did in the hospital."
"I know, I called before and you were asleep. Fran said she'd make sure you were awake now to talk to me."
"Oh, did you know that Willy and Triple Dub are here and so are Mai-Lin's folks?"
"Well, sort of. I didn't know they'd be there, but I have an idea what's going on." She admitted with a guilty sounding chuckle. "Fran thought you'd want to talk to me about things because stuff is changing again."
We talked for a few moments then and I explained what Triple Dub had suggested. Lisa-Marie said she'd be willing to work with Willy and Jean, but she suggested that Triple Dub ought to be involved too. As she said, he needed somewhere to overwinter the horses that he used on his trail rides during the summer, so why not do it on his own property. I had to agree that what she said made sense. After talking for several minutes, I felt I should get back to the kitchen. I told Lisa-Marie that I missed her. Her answer was that she and Andy planned to drive home right after Andy got out of class the next day. Then we said our goodbyes.
I went back to the kitchen and repeated what Lisa-Marie had said to Triple Dub and Willy. I was certain that the idea of keeping his horses on the farm came as a bit of a surprise to Triple Dub. We hashed over that and several other ideas for a while, but finally I suggested that we all think about the idea and meet again, but after Lisa-Marie and Andy were home for a couple of days.
We still sat there and talked though. In fact we talked until it was chore time. Then to my surprise, Mai-Lin teased Mama and Papa Tang into going out to help her and Willy do the chores. Triple Dub went home to talk to his mother again, taking Jean along. Before he left, he wanted to borrow a lock from me in order to lock the gate into the farmyard. I thought he was being paranoid about his Uncle Fred, but I found him a lock.
After he left, I turned to Fran with a frown on my face.
"I see trouble brewing with Fred Granger." I sighed. "From what I've heard, I really can't seem to like the man."
"That's no surprise." She snorted. "Fred and your Uncle Silas didn't get along that well either."
"Oh great, another family tradition, huh?"
"I wouldn't say that, other than the fact that you and Silas both like honesty while Fred is shady at best and crooked as a snake the rest of the time. I refuse to deal with him, but I like both Jean and her mother, Emily."
"Well, I feel like I've heard enough about him to start being cautious if I ever have to deal with him in any way. I suppose part of that comes from his son though."
"Well, that's an apple that never fell far from the tree." Fran snapped. "Another platitude that would apply is 'that's a chip off the old block' because the old man and the kid are as 'like as two peas in a pod."
"Oh please." I grinned. "Enough already."
"Okay, how are you feeling at the moment?"
"Huh, I felt great when I got up and I haven't done much, but right now, I feel like I've been run over and left to sit." I sighed. "I really think I'm taking a long time to get better."
"Actually, I think you should get back into bed. I'll bring you something to eat in about an hour. In fact, if you're good, Mai-Lin and I will move the card table in there and join you for the supper."
"You're spoiling me." I laughed as I got to my feet and headed back to the office and my bed.
"Yes, and I plan on doing it for another two or three weeks." She called to my back.
I relaxed in bed and read some more of my school work for the next hour or so. I was surprised when not only Mai-Lin and Fran joined me to eat, but Mama and Papa Tang joined us as well. When I suggested that I could get up and join them at the kitchen table, they all insisted I stay in bed. Instead they piled cushions and pillows behind me so I could sit up comfortably and would be able to join in the conversation during the meal.
As soon as Mama Tang tasted the beef, she wanted to know where it came from. When I told her that it was one that Uncle Silas had grown and butchered here on the farm, she started negotiating to buy one for her restaurant. That led to a discussion about government regulations because I knew that any beef sold for public consumption had to pass through a meat inspector and a qualified butcher.
Fran winked at me about then, because the conversation was suddenly in Chinese as she tried to explain to them about the legal requirements involved in the packing industry. I was surprised that she knew as much as she did, but I only understood because Mai-Lin slipped over and sat on the edge of the bed, next to me. As we ate, she kept quietly translating what the other three said. By doing that, I could occasionally correct a minor misconception, but mostly I was quite happy to let Fran take the brunt of Mama Tang's annoyance with the government bureaucracy involved. The end of the discussion came suddenly.
Papa Tang cleared his throat and looked at me. "As friend, you would sell me steer, if I buy it only for my family to eat?"
"Well, yeah, but if the beef showed up in your restaurant, you could be in deep trouble. You might even lose your license to operate. If the health inspectors found out it came from me, I could be in trouble too."
"Even if I have real butcher to cut up steer and have real inspector to stamp beef okay?" He asked.
"Umm, not if it was all done legally, that would be okay." I admitted. "I don't know how you would do it though."
"I find out." He said flatly.
That was the end of the beef discussion, but instantly Mama Tang was on about pork. She wanted to know when my sow was due to farrow and how long it would take to raise a piglet to market weight after that. I laughed and told her the piglets wouldn't even be born until mid May and then I'd probably sell the barrows as weaner pigs in July. I might have made a mistake when I told her that I planned on keeping two or three of the gilts to raise into sows.
"Why you not raise all pigs to sell full grown?" She asked instantly.
"Oh, I may raise one for meat, but I don't have the pens or the building to do it properly yet. Give me a year or two and I will."
"Could Mai-Lin raise one on her little farm?"
"Sure, but she's going to have her hands full with her garden." I laughed.
"We tell you before, she has sisters and brothers." Mama Tang said firmly.
I'd known it was coming and because of that, I laughed harder than I might have otherwise, too hard actually. I laughed so hard that I must have pulled against my stitches and suddenly I hurt quite a bit. As soon as she heard me gasp in pain, Fran instantly jumped to her feet. In seconds she and Mai-Lin were lowering me to lie flat on my back, then Mai-Lin brought me a pain pill while Fran went out to brew me a cup of her special tea.
I hadn't planned it that way, and I felt bad about it afterward, but Mama Tang felt that she was responsible for me hurting myself and after profuse apologies, the two of them left. I said my goodbyes from the bed, but Mai-Lin and Fran walked them out to their car. After they'd left, Mai-Lin came back and sat beside my bed, wanting to talk to me.
She waved off my feeble attempt to apologise for being the cause of her parents' early departure.
"Do not feel bad." Mai-Lin smiled. "Mama knows that you are getting well and she blames herself for pushing you too hard, but she likes you very much too. You are teaching us all about a new way to live, you know. Farm life is so different from what we see in town."
I just smiled and nodded slightly, not knowing what else to do.
"You are a fine man, Big Tom, a very fine man." Then Mai-Lin giggled. "I like too that you do not let Mama push you where you not want to go. Do you know that Papa has called you the 'Lion' because you listen, then turn aside Mama's arguments like they were just wind? He finds that very amusing."
"He didn't look amused to me."
"Oh, Papa only smiles with his eyes in front of most people. It is only with family and old friends that he smiles and laughs. You will see. It will come. He will learn to laugh with you. I know that." She smiled. "Today Papa saw how others of your friends ask you for your help and how you ask questions to get them to give themselves answers. Out in the barn later, he was saying how it takes a wise man to do such like that. He is very impressed because you are so young for such wisdom."
"It's not wisdom; it's just dumb curiosity." I laughed. "I found out when I was small that if I asked enough questions people would tell me what they wanted to hear, and at the same time, they'd make up their minds what they wanted to do. Today I just did the same thing."
"You may say whatever you wish, Mr Lion, I will believe what I wish while you do." She smiled as she leaned forward and kissed me on the forehead. "Now, it is time for you to rest. You have had a long day."
And with that, she got to her feet and walked out of the room. I wasn't abandoned though. Princess, the cat, jumped up on the bed and settled herself in easy stroking distance, then purred loudly as I scratched her head between her ears.
I fell asleep to the cat's loud purr.