Have you any wool?

We got the sheep sheared yesterday. It was a very stressful day all around. It was a stressful day for me. I have never gone through a shearing experience. What would be required of me? Was I was going to get an earful about the fact that the sheep looked like shag carpets?

Nice comfortable shag carpets to lie on.

My husband was not going to be around. He had other fires to put out at his job. To top it off, there was a requirement that the sheep be gathered into the barn the night before. It was pouring rain, and shearing them wet was possible, but "it would be a pain".

I didn't know how I would get them all into the barn. I had visions of stomping around the field in my boots trying to get the sheep to do what I wanted them to do, while they ran off in a million different directions. I would get stuck in the mud, and be out there for the next three weeks. However,I didn't need to worry about it so much, because the sheep weren't really fans of the rain anyway, and had taken themselves to the barn. [Except for the little lamb who was running around the yard, up and down the field calling for her MAAAHHHW. So I scolded it and told it to go find its mommy in the barn and it galloped over to find her.]

A flurry of emails had been sent back and forth with the shearer about available days and times. I felt like a middle man. I would read what he wrote to my husband. My husband would make a comment or two, and I would write the shearer a reply. One time I even sent him an email meant for my husband by mistake. (Adding to my stress. But at least I hadn't said anything too incriminating) The shearer arrived an hour earlier than we had agreed upon. I guess his other job hadn't taken too long. He came with his wife and son. They opened up the back of their van, grabbed the equipment and headed to the barns. Before he did, he asked what I wanted done with the sheep after shearing. I tried to read his mind. I honestly didn't know what to say. Would the correct answer be: They should stay in the barn? Or, they should be quarantined? If I said "They can go in the field" would I be chastised for being cruel to animals? Like I said, I was very stressed. We settled on letting them out of the barn once the haircuts were complete.

It seemed like they knew what they were doing, so I headed inside. I kept opening the window to see if I could hear anything. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. So I put my boots back on and went to the barn to peek in. Everything seemed to be under (his) control.

I went back to the house again, and waited. I peered out the window about every 10 seconds. Suddenly, the door opened and whole herd streamed out of the door. There was such a cacophony of bleating, and lambs calling "MAHHHW!" It appeared as if none of the lambs recognized their mothers after the haircuts. They would call "MAHHW" and run like crazy to the sheep they thought was their mom, and then they would be wrong. So off they'd run to the next one. It was a little sad and a little funny.

The shearer packed up his stuff. I went out to pay him and he suggested (about three or four times} that we not leave them so long next time. I agreed, but I knew that there wasn't much that we could have done about it. The season just got away on us, what with demolition and remodelling and all.

Then it was time for him to be on his way. It is a family business and they do a circle tour from the Interior of B.C. to the Coast, over to Vancouver Island, back to Alberta and a few other Prairie provinces. As they pulled out I waved, and said softly under my breath "Sure glad that's over." Now all I have to do it keep the sheep from getting out underneath the fence. Now that they don't have so much wool, they can escape quite easily. A farmer(ess)'s work is never done.