A few thoughts, written in 1925 from a farmer’s wife’s perspective.
Once upon a time, when I was a little child, there was to be held a splendid picnic on the last day of school.
The morning dawned bright and cloudless, a refreshing wind was blowing, but the outlook was not bright for me. Something had happened that prevented us from going. I shall never forget the feeling of disappointment that swept over me for that day was just made for picnics.
We children never gave up our hope of going until we saw the other children depart with pails and baskets. I don’t remember how we got through the day, except that we spent it almost entirely out of doors. There you have my secret for bearing disappointments, you grown-up folks as well as children! Get out of doors!
As farmer’s wives, something is always turning up in connection with weather or crops or livestock to interfere with our best-laid plans. It is well to have some alternative just to fill in with in case plans go awry. One day this summer I was all ready to go on a long anticipated excursion, when circumstances arose that prevented my going. The same old feeling of disappointment started to come over me but I put my second “preventive” into action: I tackled the hardest outside job I could find and worked off the unhappy mood. In addition, I read Nancy Byrd Turner’s cheery little verse:
“When things turn upside down
And inside out and look dark brown.
I rush outdoors and gaze into
The top-less sky’s eternal blue–
So calm and cool, so still and deep
With soft contented clouds like sheep.
I shade my eyes and stare and stare,
Then go back in the house and there
Begin to wonder and to doubt
What I was in that stew about!”
