Happy 4th of July
It’s a holiday weekend and this year as in the last 46 years it has a special place in my heart.
46 years ago today, my mother-in-law, Esther Schafer from Hector ask me to take her to see her friend Mrs. Conner in Redwood Falls. From Boon Lake Township three year old Carrie and I headed for Hector to pick up Esther. The hours drive was spent with Carrie talking off Grandma’s ear and showing her storybooks as she was tucked between Esther and me. At that time seatbelts and youth car seats were not standard equipment as they are today. The day was sunny and the drive was uneventful. It was to be the last road trip I had planned with Esther as I was just at the nine month of my pregnancy.
After an afternoon of chit chat the three of us told Mrs. Conners we needed to head for home. Carrie’s dad would soon be starting the late afternoon barn chores and I would be driving into our driveway just about the time that the 300 laying hens would be expecting me to fill the ground feed containers. Carrie always helped filling a pail with oats from the bin for the hens, but was not about to enter the hen house with all the fluttering of wings.
As we were on the out skirts of Redwood Falls, Esther wanted to treat us and we made a swing into the Hardee’s for a quick stop. On the way back out to the car I stubbed my shoe on an uneven sidewalk block and was able to catch myself just before I hit the concrete. By the time we were nearing Hector I knew that that tumble had tipped me into labor. Esther agreed to come out to the farm with me as she didn’t want Carrie and me to make the rest of the drive alone.
Kevin Michael Schafer – always the firecracker of my life.
Orlin was in the dairy barn when we arrived and it didn’t take long before plans on our farm needed to be changed. Esther stayed with Carrie while Orlin took me to the Hutchinson Hospital. Orlin and I agreed that I would get checked in and he would go back to the farm to get the evening milking of the dairy herd done a bit earlier than usual. Though my parents only lived several miles away, they also had milking to do but agreed to come over as soon as they were done to finish up the last of the livestock chores.
Orlin made it back to the hospital in time for Kevin Michael Schafer to be born at 8:15 p.m. Orlin took Grandma Schafer back to Hector a little later than we had planned, but she was included in the mix of all the excitement. Priceless.
Today will always be a red letter day even if the 4th of July Celebrations ceased. Just as it had happened on a certain October 17th, 1965 when Carrie arrived in my life, my world would thereafter always spin a bit faster. For the rest of my days on earth, every day of my life will include God’s blessings to me. I can’t imagine it any other way.
Happy Birthday Kevin.