I’ll let you in on a little secret: the Minnesota Farm Woman is a fake. I have been a Town and City Woman all of my life. Four years ago, when we decided to make the move from Florida back to Minnesota, one of my friends gave me the name “Minnesota Farm Woman” as a joke, and it stuck. For the 30 years before our move, I had not been more than a short drive from a mall, bookstore, or Starbucks. I got monthly massages and pedicures. I shopped at large grocery stores or specialty markets where I could purchase sushi, exotic fruits, or shrimp fresh off the boat. If we wanted to eat out, we could choose from at least 15 restaurants within five miles of our home.
Despite all of these amenities, I yearned for a life in the country and everything that went along with it. I wanted peace and quiet, country roads, apple trees, and chickens. I dreamed about a large garden, walks in the woods, a crackling fire, and more chickens. I thought about living a more self-sufficient life by growing and preserving our own food, supplemented by fresh-caught fish and our own chickens.
I am now living my dream and have learned a few life lessons along the way: 1) Deer love to nibble on apple trees, especially the larger ones that you just paid $59.00 for at the local nursery. 2) If you have made an agreement with your husband that he will till and you will weed the garden, do not ask him to till up half an acre just because you’ve always wanted a large garden, because you really won’t have any help with the weeding. 3) A crackling fire is appreciated more if the above-mentioned husband has started it for you and you don’t have to haul in wood and kindling yourself when you’ve worked all day and still have to go out and feed YOUR chickens. 4) Shrimp Lo Mein is not a quick dinner option when you live a 65 mile round trip from the nearest Chinese take-out restaurant. 5) When you have two weeks of below-zero weather and must have the heat lamps on in the chicken coop, it brings the cost of eggs up to about $7.35 per dozen. 6) I can’t possibly butcher and eat anything that I have raised and named Rose, Blanche, Sophia, and Dorothy. 7) Underneath her barn boots and warm socks, a Minnesota Farm Woman can still have a nice pedicure with bright pink toenails.
The Minnesota Farm Woman 
Wonderful post, Chris. One day, hopefully in the not too distant future I will also be enjoying the country life with all it’s delightful ups and downs.
Enjoying slogging through the snow and cold to feed the girls, gathering eggs that cost much, much more than the snow-white grocery store fare can only be understood by a true “country girl”. I think you certainly do qualify as a Minnesota Farm Woman (even with bright pink toenails).
LikeLike
This may be my favorite one so far!!!! And I’ve loved them all!
LikeLike
….and they really are pink! :o). Thank you!
LikeLike
Thanks, Lynn, for your kind words. I hope you soon can become a “country girl” and we can compare notes.
LikeLike
Brilliant! I too am a townie (born in London) now living in rural (and I mean RURAL) France. I too have a husband who will rotivate the plot and mow the orchard (if he is able to use his new BIG toys), but the weeding is my job, the animals (chickens, ducks, goose, rabbits) are always referred to as mine! Out of necessity we have managed to eat some chickens, ducks and rabbits (there is only so many babies you can hang onto and no one else wants them, they have their own!). Dispatching isn’t great, but knowing they lived the good life, wandering in the orchard eating windfalls does make them taste great!
LikeLike
….and don’t you just love it? So much more peaceful……
LikeLike
Love your stories. But this one was my life. You described it perfectly. I’m sure like me you feel you are BLessed. Please continue writing. Thanks for sharing.
LikeLike
Thanks very much. As long as people keep reading, I’ll keep writing. I am VERY blessed!
LikeLike
I think you’re fabulous and I LOVE your story. I grew up a farm girl, married a city jerk, had two beautiful girls, and then divorced the low down dirty cheatin’ S.O.B. and his psychotic family. I am now re-married to what I remember growing up, a good ol’ country boy from Kansas. Firewood, farming, chickens, gardening, canning, fishing, making our own bread, you name it! You can take the woman out of the country but you can never take the country out of the woman. 😉 It sounds like you’re more happy with where you’re at now then where you were before and it’s because you’ve allowed yourself to slow down and enjoy the SIMPLER things in life. And always, always, always, remember how blessed you are.
LikeLike
Dear Momma,
Yep…you get it, don’t you? Sounds like you have a life filled with blessings also. Thanks for reading and for commenting!
Chris
LikeLike