Thompson Family Site

Morning Glory Gazette

Graduation

May 22, 2003

It is rush rush around here as we had graduation last week. Sherry and I left for Kansas City on Thursday and just drove straight there. I sure was a tough ride. All those miles and all those garage sales on the side of the roads. We did not even stop for one. Hard to tell what kind of treasures we just drove by.

Jean graduated 8th grade on Thursday night from Holy Cross School. We were honored to be there. Several people received scholarships to attend High School. Some families had set up a scholarships to donate a hundred dollars to a student for what ever reason.

I have had problems for many years obtaining school report cards from the school. I asked Sherry if it would be ok if we started a scholarship fund and donate a hundred dollars to the school each year. Our scholarship fund would be to a student that had Christian Values even after attending a Catholic School. I am just upset that I am being treated the way I am by her school. Maybe her High School will be different.

Phillip is also thru eighth grade. It is hard to believe that it was not all that long ago that if you had an eighth grade education you could support a family. I call that the playing card. 50 years ago an eighth grade education allowed you to have the playing cards to sit at the table and make a living for your family.

Now it seems like you need to have some college education to do the same thing. I wonder how long it will be until a person will need to have a Master's degree to sit at the same table to make a living for his family.

This summer we will let both grads have an opportunity to support a family. Sherry and I are looking forward to new cars, dinner out all the time and lots of new clothes. But I guess reality will sit in and we will still have to keep our day jobs. Gosh it is good to dream...

We have not mentioned this graduation thing to any of the farm animals as they would like to have a ceremony. We do not have the time nor do we have the money to have a ceremony for them. Can you picture the cost to graduate the chickens or the fish for that matter? Who would make the caps and gown?

While in Kansas we bought some corn. I am carrying two plastic fifty gallon barrels in the back of the truck. This way I can pull into an elevator and buy cracked corn in bulk. Other wise it is over $5 for a fifty pound sack. I can buy it in bulk and save 50%.

This sounds like a great plan. But on the way to Kansas I got pulled over by the Highway Patrol. He asked me about the barrels and I told him. Then he started using terms like Body Cavity Search, Handcuffs, Search and Seizure. I guess not everyone knows that farming is a business and you need to keep overhead down. Well him and I spent some personal time together in his car and then we parted. Those Kansas Highway Patrol men are not out to make friends. You sure can tell they are not elected positions.

We got home around 3:00 a.m. on Friday. I must be aging as it was Sunday before I recovered. There once was a time that I use to come in at 0500 hours instead of getting up at 0500 hours.

The ducks and chickens like the cracked corn. We had run low on it for a while and now we are able to give it out freely. And it really shows as they run to door to beg for the corn. I think the animals are addicted to the corn. In fact sometimes they come to the gate or door to complain if they do not have corn. Sherry on the other hand has this touchy, feely idea. She thinks our farm animals are not addicted to corn but instead are corn requiring.

Yeah right, picture this, a smoky room with bad coffee being handed out. The room is full of the farm animals and they are taking turns saying I am not addicted to corn I am just corn requiring. So there is no reason for me to work the twelve steps.

I tell Sherry, she is just enabling this behavior. It makes her upset so at the current time we are not addressing this issue just hoping it goes away. Just hope that it does not get so bad that we need to send them off for rehab. I have read that the only place in the world that has this kind of therapy is in California.

From the fields of the

Morning Glory Farm
Sherry and Rick O'Mara