goats | Anything is Possible!

March 16, 2024
by JoAnna 19 Comments

SoCS: Sheep in Sheep’s Clothing

Today’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “wool.” Use it any way you’d like. Have fun!

Wool can shrink. It’s been many years since I had anything wool, but I shrank a sweater made of wool by washing it. The sweater went from a large to a small, just like that. Maybe it’s because wool belongs on sheep. Being vegan, I no longer buy or wear wool or leather.

The Farm Animal Sanctuary where I am the Thursday lunch lady has three sheep. The goats and sheep mostly graze and eat hay, but sometimes I give them carrots or lettuce. My lunch lady duties mainly apply to feeding the pigs and chickens. The sheep are Jake, who I’ve written about before, Fifi and Bennie.

I tend to spend more time with the old lady goats, but I’ve recently been paying more attention to the sheep. Jake and Fifi are generally friendly. Bennie has trust issues. He can be touchy. He even butted me a couple of times when I first started volunteering almost three years ago. Then Bennie trained me to throw him carrots to get him away from me. Debbie, who I wrote about recently, taught me that if I don’t look at Bennie, he is more likely to leave me alone. That works mostly. But I still give him carrots occasionally from my hand or throw a couple so I can get in the chicken area to feed the chickens without him trying to get some produce. Bennie and I have an understanding, now. He doesn’t like to be pet, especially on the head, but he will let me pull hay off of his abundant wool coat.

The sheep at the sanctuary get carefully sheared in the late spring. I’m not entirely sure what they do with the wool, but I think it is sometimes put in the nearby woods for animals to make nests with. I’ll have to find out. I just got an image of a coyote putting on the wool as a disguise. Coyotes, bears, bobcats, deer, rabbits, turkeys and other animals have been spotted on web cams where Debbie used to take food out for them. I hope someone is doing that still since Debbie passed. I’ll have to check. The sanctuary has never had any problems with “predators” trying to get the residents. The goats, pigs, and sheep are all secure in barns overnight. The chickens have secure coops and runs bordered with cement below ground. Debbie used to say that the food she put out for the wild ones helped keep the sanctuary residents safe. So, if a coyote put on sheep’s wool, it would be just for fun.

Here are a few photos of sanctuary residents. The last three include Debbie, the sanctuary founder who died last month. We all miss her.

To learn more about the sanctuary, visit their Facebook page HERE.

~~~

For more info about Stream of Consciousness Saturday,

visit out host, Linda Hill

by clicking HERE.

March 9, 2024
by JoAnna 18 Comments

SoCS: Signatures and Signal Fires

This week’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “signa…” Find a word that starts with “signa” and use it in your post. Enjoy!

The first word that came to mind was signature. There’s also signal. What if I write signa and see what comes after that? Signa….. Nothing yet. But I’m glad Linda is over her cold. We don’t appreciate feeling okay (normal-ish) till we’ve been sick. Thanks for the prompt, Linda!

My granddaughter, being 11, has not been taught to write in cursive. She says she can read it, so one of these days, I’m going to write her a letter in cursive. When I’ve visited in the past, I had her practice writing her name in cursive, so she’ll have a nice signature. Can you imagine signing your name in print? Is that what these young folks do these days?

In first grade, my ~~mean~~ stern teacher said I had bad penmanship and needed to practice more at home. Now, I can have very nice cursive writing when I want to. It’s fun to play with different styles of cursive … even before fonts came out on the computer.

One of my favorite scenes from The Lord of the Rings is when Pippin lights the signal fire calling for help in Gondor and sets off a chain reaction over vast mountain ranges as each signal fire is seen and the next one lit, all the way to Rohan. I suggest you enlarge the screen and enjoy the music!

A rooster crowing is kinda like an auditory signal. The most colorful rooster at Blueberry Lane Farm Animal Sanctuary is Steve. I don’t know how he got that name. Most of the roosters have biblical names like Emmanuel, Saul, and Isaac. They were rescued from kapparot. But that was not the case with Steve. I don’t recall how Steve came to the sanctuary, but he is the most colorful rooster. I took some pictures of him Thursday because I loved how the light shined on his feathers. Earlier I found a seed which had sprouted inside a pumpkin I was cutting up to feed the chickens. Then there’s the “accidental “ angel photo that showed up in my phone, followed by some goats, and an interesting sunset cloud.

Do you see an open hand? Anything else?

~~~

To find out more about Stream of Consciousness Saturday,

visit our host, Linda Hill

by clicking HERE.

November 23, 2023
by JoAnna 23 Comments

Tree Love on the Road to the Animal Sanctuary

I thought I did not have any new trees for Thursday Tree Love. But as I drove down the dirt road to volunteer at the farm animal sanctuary last Thursday, I felt awed by the beautiful mix of green, orange, and yellow with the blue November sky. There was no one tree that stood out, but rather a natural diversity flourished in community.

After preparing and feeding lunch to the pigs and chickens, and brushing the older goats, I drove back down the road, pulled over, and got out to soak up the tree love.

Below are a few of the sanctuary residents. Click each photo to see the whole image.

Today, the volunteers and staff met at the sanctuary for a vegan Thanksgiving potluck. It was so delicious and peaceful.

…

Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thakur.

For more tree love,

visit Parul at Happiness and Food.

February 11, 2023
by JoAnna 22 Comments

SoCS: Heartbreak, Healing, Angels, and Goats

Today’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “heart.” Use it any way you like. Have fun!

I’m almost finished reading Glennon Doyle’s book, Untamed, which I think was recommended by Laura at https://riddlefromthemiddle.com/ (Correct me if I’m wrong, Laura.) It’s been a while since I am probably the slowest reader in bloglandia. The book has lots of gems about relationships with self and others and being true to ourselves. A couple nights ago, I read about purpose. She wrote that whatever breaks your heart, that is where your purpose lies. (I’m paraphrasing from memory.)

She listed my heartbreakers in her examples: animal cruelty and environment. This doesn’t mean I have to save every animal and the planet as I had hoped from the idealism of adolescence. Anything is possible, but we can at least do our part in our own little corner of the planet to heal what breaks our hearts.

If another person breaks our hearts, finding our bigger purpose helps along with crying and pampering ourselves. Small steps, small tasks of healing are okay. Because we have to take care of ourselves, too.

“Follow your heart but take your brain with you,” is a quote in my short book about finding a healthy relationship. (See sidebar) We need both heart and brain to make good decisions.

…

(I wrote the above yesterday afternoon, thinking maybe that was it for this SoCS. Good enough.)

A few hours later, I watched PBS news about the earthquake in Syria and Turkey that has killed many thousands of people. (23,000 people.) I watched a father crying, heartbroken, at the death of his child. He said they were used to missiles from planes – acts of war, but this was an act of God.

I don’t believe God would do this. But I don’t really know. Would God allow this to happen? An age-old question. There are heartbreaks we can do little about. But we can, at the very least, pray. Watching the father crying for his lost child, I wanted to put my arms around him and prayed for angels to hold him in his grief which cannot be removed, but maybe can be softened a tiny bit.

We have natural endorphins in our bodies that help reduce pain. Our physical pain would be worse without those natural endorphins that go away if replaced repeatedly with synthetic drugs/opiates which may then lead to withdrawal. Maybe if the angels didn’t hold us in our grief, the emotional pain would be worse. It’s bad enough that we have earthquakes and floods. Humans need to stop killing each other.

Sigh. What can we do? Our part is all. Do small things with great love, like Mother Teresa said. Be kind. Pray for the wounded and grieving. Thank the angels.

At Blueberry Lane Farm Animal Sanctuary, I don’t do much. Just cut up produce for Thursday lunch and feed it to the pigs and chickens. Then I go hang out with the old lady goats. This past week, I also went on Monday since some volunteers were out of town. Seeing me twice in one week, the old lady goats, Esther and Delilah, came to me on Thursday, wanting me to brush them and pet them, even after they knew I didn’t have any more carrots. Delilah has never done that before. So, I sat between them and brushed them and pet them which turned into giving them mini massages…. with great love.

I don’t know why this picture of Esther and Delilah got so small. I don’t remember cropping it.

Please click on the picture to see the sweet old goats.

goats

~~~

For more about Stream of Consciousness Saturday,

visit our host with heart, Linda Hill

by clicking HERE.

January 14, 2023
by JoAnna 29 Comments

SoCS: Once Upon a Time in Newfoundland, The Moody Blues Song, and Animal Sanctuary Pictures

Today’s prompt for #JusJoJan the 14th and Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “once upon a time.” Start your post with “Once upon a time,” then write whatever comes to you, whether it be fact or fiction. Have fun!

Once upon a time we didn’t have phones. Or even TVs. Computers were barely imaginable by the average person. In the 1960s, we had a party line and a phone that sat on a table with a chord. We knew the important numbers by heart. There were three TV stations in black and white. And we thought it was pretty cool.

Lassie and Captain Kangaroo were my favorite shows when I was barely walking and later in kindergarten. Except in kindergarten when we were stationed on the Argentia Naval Base in Newfoundland, Canada. There was only one TV station, and a lot of French was spoken. When my dad got orders to go to Artentia (pronounced Argencia) mom thought he said Argentina. For a city girl from Washington DC, my mom found Newfoundland remote, a bit boring, and of course, cold.

Cold reminds me of the “Cold War” that was going on then. It seemed like everyone was talking about The Russians. I must have picked up on the tension and said, “I hate the Russians.” My dad stopped what he was doing, probably spit polishing his boots, and said, “Honey, you shouldn’t hate the Russians. You should feel sorry for them.”

That was one of the things my dad said that stuck with me. Like “Nothing is impossible” when I was 13.

Don’t hate. and Anything is possible.

Well, mom made the best of being in the frozen wilderness by making friends with the other military wives. The men used to play pinocle. I remember going sledding down a hill out back and that there were wolves howling at night. We used to go on picnics and go out to see the blue icebergs. I would have appreciated the remote location more if I had been older.

Stepping out of the stream, or maybe the stream took me there, I looked up Argentia to make sure I was spelling it right. The base was decommissioned in 1973 and the land returned to the Canadian/Newfoundland government.

One of my favorite photos of that time and place was this picnic photo. I’m wearing saddle shoes.

Mom must be wearing Dad’s jacket. Probably a Marine Corps jacket of some kind because it’s red. But that’s just a guess. We went on a lot of family picnics when I was a kid. Why don’t we do that anymore? I wonder what lead me to write about this time and place which I tend to romanticize. These are some of my earliest memories.

And then there’s this nostalgic Moody Blues song and video about remembering an old romance.

More recent memories include the residents of Blueberry Lane Farm Animal Sanctuary where I prepare and serve lunch on Thursdays. Jake, the sheep had a peculiar way of smelling something interesting in the air. Once upon a time, most of these animals were abused or neglected. Now they are living their best lives. Ed, the big rooster in the third gallery picture, had been confined at county animal services (near barking dogs) and had attacked a woman to the point of her needing hospital care. Now, Ed has learned he can trust Debbie and the caretakers at the sanctuary.

~~~

Stream of Consciousness Saturday is hosted by author, Linda G. Hill.

For more streams and details, visit Linda HERE.

August 13, 2022
by JoAnna 26 Comments

SoCS: Kinder, Gentler Motivation

Today’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is starts with “u.” Find a word that starts with the letter “u” and use it however you’d like. Bonus points if it’s the first word in your post. Enjoy!

“Use it or lose it,” was the first thing I thought about after reading the prompt. I believe this is true, up to a point. There’s a fine line between use and overuse. With osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, scoliosis, plantar fasciitis, and heel spurs, I have to be careful and look for the right kind of use (exercise) without overdoing it. All those ailments sound like a lot, but they’re not that serious if I find the right self-care balance.

I’ve figured out that if I do my foot exercises (mostly flexing), wear shoes with lots of cushioning (love my Oofos) and don’t walk on pavement much, my feet are able to take me on walks around the neighborhood and maybe a little hiking in the woods or walking on the beach. If I overdo (overuse) my feet, I have to ice them and rest some.

The back balance between use and overuse is a little trickier. Regular exercise is important, but it’s easy to strain a muscle, especially doing yard work which I really enjoy. My daughter just started selling essential oils and I’ve found I love the Deep Blue stick which is a roll on with gentle cool/warmth instead of the burn of some popular topical analgesics. But enough on that. I don’t want to do a commercial.

Another motivational quote I’m reminded of is “What doesn’t kill us, makes us stronger.” That may be true up to a point. Stress can kill over time. Stress can cause stomach and other gastrointestinal problems, all kinds of physical problems over time. Cortisol…. you can look it up. A little stress is good. A little stress here and there does make us stronger if we learn how to cope. That applies to both physical and mental stress, but too much can kill us. Being in an unhealthy relationship or toxic job can take years off our lives. In 2016 I had been saying for years, “I’m not going to let this job kill me.” Thankfully I got out in 2017. Now, I’m healing, reclaiming those years.

The “motivational” quote I really hate is, “Go big or go home.” Maybe I’m hearing that wrong, but maybe I did good to just show up. Have you seen this on a T shirt? I want one.

Sorry I’m late.

I didn’t want to come.

So far, I’ve never actually said this out loud, but I must want to, because it’s so funny. It’s an introvert thing.

I no longer have to make A’s on my report card. Thank God I don’t have job evaluations anymore.

It’s okay if some people want to go big and excel at a sport, or job, or talent, but we don’t need to make ourselves sick or crazy. Sometimes, I’m on time. Sometimes I’m late. Sometimes I leave early. Sometimes I don’t go. Sometimes, I do.

Instead of “Go big or go home,” how about,

Be nice or go home.

Be nice or apologize.

Okay, you don’t have to be nice, just don’t be mean.

Play fair or take a time out.

I like time outs. I can carry a blanket in my car for time outs. Or I’ll go play with the dog. Any dog. Or the goats and chickens….

Here’s a video of me at Blueberry Lane Farm Animal Sanctuary with Delilah and Amos who I keep calling Simon, but doesn’t care. I showed up and brought him lunch.

There are 2 pigs, 3 sheep, 9 goats, 11 roosters and one hen at the sanctuary. The chickens have various levels of rehabilitation and housing. Amos has a foot handicap and currently lives with matriarchal goats, Delilah and Esther. He can see and crow with the other roosters.

Photos from my walks with Marley:

For more on Stream of Consciousness Saturday, visit out host, Linda G. Hill by clicking HERE.

August 10, 2022
by JoAnna 6 Comments

CFFC: The Presence of Animals

This week our topic for Cee’s Fun Photo Challenge is celebrating what Connects you to the present moment.

Yesterday’s history

Tomorrow’s a mystery

Today is a gift

That’s why they call it the present.

All of nature connects me to the gift of the present moment, but animals are especially good at drawing me in. Maybe it’s because they are experts at being in the here and now. Walking and training my dog, Marley requires that I be present and vigilant as he is constantly wanting to chase or smell something. We’ve made progress. Stroking the formerly feral Mama Cat is soothing as I listen to her purr which gets louder over time.

The residents at the Farm Animal Sanctuary where I volunteer are always doing something interesting to help me focus on the now. At least once a week, I go there to cut produce and feed the two pigs and 11 roosters, then I hang out with the goats. There are also three sheep at the sanctuary who graze at will.

For more on CFFC, visit our host, Cee by clicking HERE.

May 28, 2022
by JoAnna 32 Comments

SoCS: Trials, Losses, and How Do We Heal?

Our prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “trail/trial.” Use one, use both, use them any way you’d like. Bonus points if you use both. Have fun! ….

There’s a song I like, except maybe for a couple of lines, called “Blessings.” Which lines, I won’t go into. Never mind that. But the chorus goes:

“What if your blessings come through raindrops?

What if your healing comes through tears?

What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know you’re near?

What if trials in this life, are your mercies in disguise.”

It’s about how trials, disappointments, and challenges bring us closer to God. The song works well when applied to my divorce which, as I wrote about recently, turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

The problem now is that it does not seem to apply to the loss of a child. My heart and mind go to the parents who lost children to brutal, needless, senseless deaths by an 18-year-old who should never have been able to buy a gun and certainly not a weapon of war, in Texas.

I cannot imagine how those worst of trials can be a blessing. I don’t even know if the death of my sister, killed by a drunk driver on her 16th birthday, could have been a blessing to anyone, even with my parents’ dedicating the family room at the shelter in her memory. I don’t know how the loss of a child could be a blessing. Anything is possible, yes, but I would not say that to someone who has just lost a child. I would imagine the anger and overwhelming grief would be too much to even think of blessings, right now.

The husband of a teacher who was killed died from a heart attack – a broken heart – while preparing for his wife’s funeral. Joe and Irma Garcia had been married for 24 years. They had been high school sweethearts.

It’s so wrong. Wrong upon wrong, upon wrong, as we are finding out in the investigation.

Other countries have done better than the US when it comes to gun control and this type of murder. That’s for sure. There is a sickness in ~~the heart of~~ my country. (I just struck through “the heart of” because we have good hearts. Mostly.) Maybe we can recover from this sickness. Individual states have and can pass sensible gun laws. We can improve mental health services, address school dropout rates, etc., but I believe it’s going to take some kind of bigger shift. It’s complicated. Or maybe not.

I hope the investigations will lead to improvements. My hope is floundering a bit which is not typical. It will come as no surprise to most of my readers that I believe we need more balance between bad news and good news. That’s part of the sickness – a lack of balance.

Healing. How do we heal? Look for the good. Look for the true heroes, like teachers who continue to teach in schools, first responders who do what is necessary, leaders who have the courage to make changes for a more peaceful country, and a more peaceful world, parents who keep going after heartbreaking loss. Look for the heroes. Hold them up. Hold them in your heart. Keep them in your prayers. We can all do our part to nurture peace.

I know this is a rambling rant. Sometimes that’s what you get in the stream of consciousness. I confess I have gone back and edited a little. It was badly needed.

Maybe I should’ve written about hiking trails. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll put some in a gallery. There’s something coming to me about “The Peace of Wild Things” – a poem by Wendell Berry.

Below are some of my most recent photos from the Farm Animal Sanctuary

~~~

For more streams of consciousness and rules, visit our host, Linda Hill by following this trail: https://lindaghill.com/2022/05/27/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-may-28-2022/

May 7, 2022
by JoAnna 18 Comments

SoCS: Things my Parents Said about Possibility, Goats, Food, Wishes and Spit

Today’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “a phrase you grew up with.” Include in your post a phrase your mom/dad/grandparent/sibling used all the time when you were growing up, or just write whatever inspires you based on that phrase. Enjoy!

I have to start by honoring my father, Jim, who would have been…. 91 on May 2 if he was still in this world. You may have read that my father inspired the title of my blog by telling me when I was 12 years old:

“Nothing is Impossible.”

He was told that by his scoutmaster, probably in the 1940s and passed it on to me in the 1960s. He didn’t make this statement a lot, but the tone of his voice and the state of my impressionable mind made it stick. “Nothing is impossible” became “Anything is possible.”

My dad also said,

“Outstanding!”

I think that was a common military word. It felt good to hear that one. He also said things in what sounded like Korean or Vietnamese (he served as a Marine in both those wars), but I think they were curse words, so I’m not going to try to guess how they might be spelled.

Mom often said,

“Kids are baby goats,”

She said that whenever someone would call children kids. Dad picked that up, too. Sorry, Mom, but I sometimes say kids. Mom also said,

“We don’t throw away food.”

That came from growing up during “The Great Depression.” The other thing mom said a lot was,

“Wish in one hand and spit in the other and see which one gets filled up first.”

There are other versions of that saying which Mom would not want me to share. Still, I think there is some value in wishing as long as we do the footwork to make our wishes come true. Not that we can MAKE them come true every time, but we can manifest our dreams. We can move in the direction of our hopes and dreams, one step as time. Sometimes we manifest something even better!

As I look at that word, manifest, it conjures up all kinds of trash in the stream of consciousness. It’s not a pleasant-sounding word, but it has a powerful meaning. What would be another word that means nurturing dreams into reality? Well, I don’t know. But I know this:

Reading these sayings from my parents, it sounds like my dad was more of a dreamer and my mom was stern. That was not the case at all, at least not on the surface. Dad was practical and hardworking. Mom was more romantic, though dad had his romantic side, too. Just for the record.

I could write a whole other post about goats. Summing it up: Don’t take baby goats away from their mamas.

Esther and Delilah came to the sanctuary pregnant. It was the first time they were allowed to keep their babies. I don’t have a good picture of Delilah, but Jack and Henry are her sons. Esther’s daughter was named Miracle, aka Mira, because she was a complete surprise, and her mama is so old.

Happy Mother’s Day to goat mamas, dog mamas, cat mamas, llama mamas and

all the mamas everywhere.

~~~

For more sayings, streams, and rules, visit our most excellent host, Linda G. Hill HERE.

January 23, 2022
by JoAnna 26 Comments

More Than Surviving at the Farm Animal Sanctuary

Today’s prompt for Just Jot it January is “surviving.” Thanks to Wendy for the prompt and to our host, Linda Hill, for keeping us going! You can learn more about #JusJoJan at Linda’s post HERE.

Until I started volunteering at Blueberry Lane Farm Animal Sanctuary, I hadn’t had much personal experience with chickens, goats, or pigs. Now, the menagerie is like extended family. At the sanctuary, they are not just surviving, they are thriving, and they are loved.

Every Thursday, I prepare lunch for the sanctuary residents. I cut up produce and feed it to the pigs and roosters and check to make sure the goats have plenty of hay. The pigs were rescued from factory farms and the roosters from kapparot where live chickens are twirled overhead. The roosters get along fine for the most part. After feeding, I like to hang out with the gentle old lady goats. The goats were rescued from petting zoos or breeders where they were not well cared for. Esther is one of my favorites. It’s taken a while for her to trust me.

Esther’s stomachs are permanently distended because she was not fed properly. When she arrived at the sanctuary, Esther was secretly pregnant. Her daughter, Mira, short for Miracle, was a sweet surprise. Mira, being born on the farm, is friendly and assertive. Now, Esther gets different kinds of hay, forages in the yard, and gets lettuce and other greens as a treat. She loves it when I pick an occasional green leaf off of a tree for her.

Surviving is usually better than not surviving, especially if there’s the hope of something better. Animals living in small cages, enclosures where they cannot turn around, as with veal calves and lactating pigs, or living in terribly crowded conditions on factory farms, may be surviving, but their lives are miserable. We humans can do better. This is why I’ve progressed to being about 95% vegan and why I volunteer at the sanctuary. If you’ve thought about reducing your meat consumption, it’s now easier than ever. Vegan alternatives and restaurants are popping up in most cities. Consider meatless Mondays. It’s a great time of year for minestrone or lentil soup!

‘The most ethical diet just so happens to be the most environmentally sound diet and just so happens to be the healthiest’ – Dr Michael Gregor (quote found here.)