Someday when I’m 90 and sitting in the rocking chair on my front porch counting my blessings, a great joy of my life will have been the privilege of helping tell agriculture’s story in Indiana Prairie Farmer and other publications. Some of that joy comes from the opportunities I had to take my wife, Sandra, along on some of those adventures.

As a very busy school nurse, she couldn’t go with me that often. But over 15 years, it still amounted to a lot of trips together. To people who don’t “get farming,” the idea that something like this could be fun would almost inevitably draw a glazed eye roll and a response of “Really?” But like me, Sandra was a farm kid, and we had a blast!

For us, it was a “cheap date,” of sorts. But more importantly, it was the chance for two busy people to have some much-needed time together, traveling the highways and country roads of northern Indiana. It was fun, seeing growing crops, attractive farmsteads and cattle in the pastures, and getting ideas to bring home to our own small farm — a pretty shade of dark red for our new barn, or a good-looking fence for our pasture.

Special memories
Of the many trips we made, a few really stick out:

• Twilight beef tour in Elkhart County. We went on a hayride at sunset, looking at an exceptional cow-calf herd, followed by Hoosier rib-eye steak sandwiches.

• Grandsons and pigs. We took our young grandsons along for the grand opening of the Fair Oaks Pig Adventure. A picture of the boys made it into my article in Indiana Prairie Farmer, and they had so much fun, they still talk about it years later.

• Inside the cow experience! Once, at a 4-H dairy event, attendees were given the chance to stick their arms into a specially-equipped Holstein cow’s rumen. After hearing what all went on in there, it sounded nasty to me. But Sandra, ever the nurse, saw it as just another anatomy lesson and said, “I’ll do it.”

• New friends. Occasionally our cheap dates would turn into a double date, of sorts. Once, I was doing a story on a farm shop, and I’d told the farmer that the interview and pictures would probably take 45 minutes. He brought his wife, an elementary school teacher, to the interview, which we did in the kitchen area of their very cool shop. We spent two hours together! While I took pictures, Sandra and the wife chatted away about the joys of working with elementary school kids. After I got done, they said, “Would you like to see our house?” and we said “Sure.” Then after that, they said, “Would you like to go out for lunch?”

• Not a hit! On another occasion, I took Sandra on a manure management field day, complete with demonstrations. It was a nice day — pretty drive, great meal, good fellowship — and overall we had a nice time. But at the end, she told me, “If you have a chance to cover another one of those, I think I’ll pass.”

• Love those animals. If my assignment had anything to do with baby calves, Fair Oaks Farms, Amish country or horses, there was no way Sandra would let me leave her behind. And just about always, we’d find some bonus fun thing to do on our way home — discovering a town we’d never seen before, swinging a few miles out of the way to catch a favorite restaurant, getting some ice cream or experiencing some other serendipitous event.

Curve in the road
Last spring, after a brief illness, the Lord unexpectedly called Sandra home. A cancer survivor, the side effects of a bone marrow transplant 25 years earlier finally caught up with her. Although I know it’s not possible, I’d give anything to take her with me on just one more assignment.

As I reflect, I feel fortunate to have a wealth of wonderful memories of our trips together. Mostly, I treasure the fact that she just liked to be with me when those opportunities came up. I almost always thanked her for going with me and told her it was fun to have her along. But now I wish I’d told her even more often.

Farming is a notoriously husband-and-wife undertaking, and if you have a valued spouse with whom you’re blessed to spend your life in this adventure called agriculture, treasure that opportunity, and as the saying goes, “Milk it for all it’s worth!” Tell them how much you love them and are thankful for them.

Most of all, thank God for the privilege and the blessing of letting you do it together.

Boone writes from Wabash, Ind.