While I’m home recuperating from the illness that landed me in the hospital last week, I have had a lot of time to think about things. One of the things I have been thinking about a lot is what I would like to accomplish this winter down the farm. I have several different projects that I want to take on, one of them being widening the road up to the apple trees so that I can drive my truck up there without scratching it up. In thinking about this I thought, ‘I wish I could widen the whole road going around the farm so I could drive all the way around’. In my head when it comes to the farm I feel like I am still a 17 year old kid who knows shit about shit and can’t do anything without getting permission. In thinking about widening the road I thought about the amount of trees that I would need to cut down. I then felt like that 17 year old kid and thought about who I needed to ask permission to do such work. Then a logic bomb hit me — I don’t need to ask for permission from anyone. The place is mine now. I can do whatever I want and cut whatever I want without permission.
One of the things that I have had a hard to get over is that the place is mine now to take care of. For my whole life my dad called all the shots down there. In fact, it was him and our land manager that made all of the calls about what trees would be taken down, what sections would be cleared, and what goes where. In my screwed up brain I think I have replaced my dad’s voice by proxy with our land manger’s. That means that if I wanted to do something such as widening the road, in some weird way I feel as if I need to get his permission before I pick up a chain saw because he is the elder down there that has taken care of the place for most of my life with my dad. With him gone, he’s in charge. That’s the 17 year old in me talking. The 41 year old need to come to the realization that it’s my show now. What I say goes and I don’t need anyone’s permission to do anything down there. If I went down there tomorrow (I wish!) I could clear cut whatever I wanted to and I’d have no one to answer to. If I want to widen the road, or even cut in a new road, I don’t need anyone’s permission to do so. In fact, during the last day of deer season we talked about what cuts he wanted to do this year. I disagreed with one of the cuts he wanted to make and he immediately backed down and said he wouldn’t cut there. He then asked permission to drop another section of trees and I told him he could but with one or two conditions. He agreed to those conditions and said he would start after the new year. This was not the first time he and I have disagreed since me taking over 2 years ago, but this was the first time I felt like he respected me enough to not argue his point. That’s where I need to be mentally when I think about the projects I want to do. The 17 year old in me need to go to work at the video rental store while the 41 year old gets the farm ready to be enjoyed for the next 30 year of my life.
