Day And Night Communication

Communication is an important part of daily farm life, actually the word important is not correct, necessary is more exact. Concise communication alerts others of needs, wants, dangers and all sorts of other things. Distance and noise interfere with exchanges of information. Many raunchy jokes come from the goofy pantomimes that a person can go through in an effort to get his or her point across. On the farm, we carry our cell phones to make it easier to communicate to whoever happens to be able to give assistance. However, more likely than not, we revert to gestures, hand signals, body language and hollering to send and receive vital information.

My voice does not have a rich tone, it does not carry far even though I try to project. When I get nervous or excited or attempt to send vital messages, my throat constricts and each sound that follows gets higher and higher in the musical scale. I practically squeak rather than holler.

Mike on the other hand has a loud, booming voice to begin with and when he gets louder it can carry far and wide. When he yells or whistles, elk on the other side of the farm pick up their heads at the sounds before high-tailing it for the woods. Even his loudness cannot overcome many of the noises of equipment.

I was running the power saw and had my earplugs in tight for protection. Mike began communicating something important. Between the loud saw and sound dampening plugs, I though he said, gestured and mimed that there was a gorilla behind the log deck when what he was really saying was that he would be moving some of the logs and I should get out of the way. See what I mean by necessary?

I helps to know your family, friends, co-workers, etc. in a time like that.

My sister is one of those people who understands much of my communication, even when it is garbled, squeaky, or even a pantomime. We are both early risers and while our families sleep, we rely on text messages that do not disturb anyone else. The messages are not proper sentences and many times not sentences at all, sometimes just a single word sent through space and time to get the meaning across the miles.

The other morning, I had a serious complaint and was hoping to get a little sympathy. I texted the message;

(Me-without preamble) Woke with a headache at 1am because I was dreaming about Martin Sheen wearing one of my girly flowered T-shirts and looking better than me.
3 aspirin and 4 hours more of sleep has me feeling better but keep thinking about that shirt…

*{Many people without knowing the way I function, would be seriously worried about my state of mental health at this point. But it did not disturb my sis in the least.}

(Sis-without acknowledgement of my discomfort or stability, answered) You’re always so damn busy! And really, Martin Sheen?

(Sis-adding to the text) So I woke with one of the worst Charlie horses I have ever had. I was crying. Leg still hurts. Lu’s been hiding under the bed

*{For clear communication and that you understand, Lu is the cat, not the husband}

(Me-without empathy for her predicament) Guess Martin is better than Charlie

(Sis-completely in agreement and on the same page) By a landslide

Important and not-so-important communication is vital to our existence. Getting our point across in a clear manner keeps the farm operating, the economy running, and saves me from gorillas in the log deck.

That is all for todays class, go out there and share your information efficiently with the world.