Filed under: Community On The Earth
08 Sunday and still no land line phone service. Really feeling awful from my cold I was happy not to be at the shop that day. Normally I am a healthy person with a sturdy immune system, but the week had taken its toll. No long trips this day, we ventured out in the frosty weather to the Dryad firestation (that was the local command center) and picked up firewood and cleaning supplies (the supplies had been donated by the Latter Day Saints Church with literature inside each bucket, to save our souls no doubt, bless their hearts). Negotiating the short but bumpy trip was complicated by the presense of large Guardsmen trucks, dumptrucks, road scrapers and other heavy equipment, massing to try and put the neighborhood back together, clear rubbish and level the torn up roads, to create an imprompto local dumpsite for fast growing mountains of ruined furniture and appliances and personal possessions. While at the Dryad firestation I had a chance to look over the wall of newspaper clippings and collection of photographs posted by neighbors and relief workers. Above the collage was written in colored pen, “Life is Good”.
We dropped off a couple of bottles of hydrogen peroxide and a few packages of face masks for the relief workers who needed a bleach alternative. Concerns were being voiced about the toxicity of the sewage laden mud that was everywhere. Not only had estimated 190 septic systems been compromised, supplies of gardening sheds had been sacked — pesticides, herbicides, gasoline and oil from cars and tractors, transmission fluid, radiator fluid — and now the decaying animals buried in the mud and still submerged to add to the mess. On the way home I noted in one of the higher pastures was an odd mix of animals — the usual horses and cows but also now some goats — and I was greatly relieved to recognize the same three goats Chance and I had helped herd back up during the rainstorm, happily munching in a clean dry borrowed pasture. I had been agonizing on the fate of those three — had we helped to round them up only to have sent them back to their soon-to-be submerged pens and a horrible death? Instead of that fate they were dry and happy — relatively speaking — and I was very relieved.
09 Monday — another day off. After feeding in the frosty morning, I settled into my computer chair to resume writing (this journal). Still no phone, I was storing up the days to post once I was able to get back online. Typing away, I glanced up to see Em running up to the house from the barn. Uh-oh, this can’t be good! I spun up out of my chair, grabbing a heavy coat and gloves as I went, meeting her at the door, she gasped–
“We have babies in the barn!”
Well, and where else would they be? So what? No, NEW BABIES!
OH!! Frakka had her babies, two little girls. In all the excitement and distraction, none of us had thought to keep a special eye on her even though we kinda knew she was getting close (she’s the goat who had the single boy — Wonka — who she immediately rejected and we bottle fed). This time she seemed far less stressed by the whole ordeal and apparently was willing to try the mama goat thing. THAT was welcome news — bringing two newborn babies into the house to bottle feed every few hours was not the kind of fun we were prepared to have — not at this particular time that is. So we rigged up burlap walls for the nursery pen to keep out the drafts, set it up with clean straw and a hanging heat lamp (temperature was dropping to below freezing these nights) and spent a few minutes helping the babies figure out what end of mama to focus on. Fortunately both they and Frakka were patient with each other and they all got it figured out. WHEW.
Still no door to door mail service, so I would have to head up to the Doty post office to pick up my mail — I pulled together the stack of envelopes with payments inside — even though things were upside down, the bills still had to be paid. As though nothing had happened.
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A Place For The Future Past 