It was the first week of December, which for me can be perhaps the most exasperating time of the entire year. While I love the feeling of the Christmas season as it begins to take over our consciousness, the short days and the long chores associated with that time of year tend to sometimes leave me a little surly.

There’s a quote I’ve often turned to when I’m most in need of divine reinforcement. It is this: “The thing about truth is that it exists beyond belief. It is true even if nobody believes it.”

Metachromatic leukodystrophy (MLD). Remember that name. It’s a rare genetic disease that gradually destroys the body’s nervous system. It’s a terminal disease.

“Are you sure she’s ok? Her breathing sure doesn’t sound right.” It was my wife’s concerned query as she stood next to me holding one hind leg of the 200-pound calf as I held the other leg.

What a peculiar lot we are. It’s true I generally agree with our boast that the people who are the brains and guts and muscle of modern North American agriculture are quite possibly the most creative, efficient, industrious, hard-working people God has placed on this earth.

It will come as a new revelation to exactly nobody that I am cheap, notoriously so. I think I like to consider this particular trait in other terms. Cheap has a negative connotation, even a stigma, attached to it.

There’s a funny thing about raising and chasing kids in farm and ranch country. Well, actually there’s a whole pile of peculiar things about growing a crop of rural humans, but for now, I’ll narrow my focus for the sake of a good story.

Mastering the art of the horse trade is something I’ve never quite been able to fully comprehend nor accomplish. I’ve tried it, to be sure, but it’s never really worked out in my favor.

We were never much of a vacationing family. For some reason or other, most likely revolving around time and finances, my kids were never really treated to the classic Disneyland or East Coast family vacation.

It wasn’t really the best of situations. My wife had volunteered to drive her Arizona snowbird parents from our place in southern Idaho back to their home in the far-northern extreme of the Idaho Panhandle, a tedious 10-hour drive under ideal conditions made even more taxing and time-consuming by the demands and requirements of her octogenarian passengers.