Baa…
Lambing over the halfway mark.
This is the singles mob ie, all those mums who are having single bubs – all those little white dots are lambs.
The twinning mob is in another paddock around the front of the property near the silos.
After writing the post on the Templar Commanderie in France with its beautiful old stone and woodwork, I was in the mood for ruins of all kinds.
It seems we have some of our own.
We bought our sheep property about twelve years ago and one of the things that attracted us to the place, apart from it’s excellent farm soil, its wonderful hills and views, house, shearing shed and machinery shed, dams, proximity to the coast and the city etc etc etc – was the apparent history right before our very eyes.
Driving to a beach down the road from House the other day, we met a mob of sheep being shifted to fresh pasture.
This grazing property is my all time favourite. If I won a lottery and the owners would sell, I would buy it yesterday (that’s not to say I don’t love our own farm with it’s wonderful old stone barn and ruins of stables, bakehouse, smithy’s and more).
Damned cold today. 7 degrees Celsius (44 fahrenheit). Rugged up and hopped behind OH on the four wheeler to feed out to those of our girls with child!
It’s been the toughest summer and autumn and we’ve got to the hard end of our pasture so we feed out our own hay cut from summer 2011 when we had grass ‘as high as an elephant’s eye.’ Plus barley harvested in 2011 from our own crops. But mainly sheep pellets which are a grain mix and which the girls think is chocolate!
It’s nearly the beginning of winter. Another month-ish.
Today it was 26 degrees at the farm, 78 degrees Fahrenheit. And I am back in shorts and a polo shirt. The wind is howling and we have a bushfire close by. Another one – nearly in winter!
Wake up and get straight into swimsuit. Sky is pale blue, maybe smoke haze from Victoria.
Down to the beach to favourite pozzie in front of pine trees. Smells resinous in the warmth.
In water by 10AM. Glorious. Walk through waist deep shallows in boat channel, moving out of way of incomers and outgoers. Then just dive in and swim a few lengths between the marker poles. Float on back like a star. Hair drifting out, rocking with the odd tiny wave, can hear the odd tic-tic-tic sound of ‘under the sea’.
I’d had a good morning. Dressed in my city jeans, city shirt and city shoes (favourite camel JP Tods bought from the USA), city perfume, city makeup, jewelry, clean hair … you know, the sort of thing you do when you are going shopping. Not dressed up to the nines but a damn sight better than the last five months of aged shorts or farm jeans.
‘Jumbuck is an Australian term for sheep, featured in Banjo Paterson’s poem “Waltzing Matilda.” ‘ Wikipedia
My life outside of writing might be a little different to the average sort. It’s great to wear a good pair of jeans, a nice sweater or shirt, to have a good hair day and have a face enhanced with good cosmetics.
Historically, Australia was said to have derived its burgeoning economy from the sheep’s back. Our history is marked by the introduction of Saxon merino sheep to the colonies in 1804. Farming wool became iconic and superfine Australian wool became world-renowned, beloved everywhere for its softness and purity.
Fear.
The slither of ice down the spine.
The way the heart seems to stop beating for a millisecond before it begins a frenzied gallop.
The sort of sensation that writers must call upon when creating tension.