The Rural Voice, 1990-08, Page 83cttcs
IDUAS ADD IMO. 110
World Wide
Escorted Tours
Om. Rap. 1694982
WE HAVE SOMETHING
FOR EVERYONE
AUGUST
13 — 3 Day Frankenmuth
17 — 3 Day Wheeling, West Virgina
20 — 5 Day Scott's Oquaga Lake Resort
22 — 5 Day Pennsylvania Dutch
23 — 2 Day Niagara Falls & the Shaw Festival
25 — 2 Day Greenfield Village & the
Henry Ford Museum
27 — 6 Day Smokey Mountain Magic
SEPTEMBER
8 — 6 Day Wildwood & Cape May,
New Jersey
12 — 5 Day Pennsylvania Dutch
13 — 5 Day Nashville Special
17 — 5 Day Scott's Oquaga Lake Resort
17 — 5 Day Agawa Canyon
18 — 6 Day Montreal and Quebec
21 — 5 Day Agawa Canyon
22 — 5 Day Agawa Canyon
24 — 6 Day Circle Lake Superior
26 — 5 Day Vermont - The Green Mountain
State
28 — 6 Day Resorts Ontario
30 — 5 Day Agawa Canyon
OCTOBER
1 — 5 Day Vermont
5 — 4 Day Nashville
6 — 3 Day Wheeling & Hawaii in Pittsburgh
9 — 4 Day New York Finger Lakes
11 — 2 Day Niagara Falls & the Shaw Festival
13 — 8 Day Historic America & the
Nation's Capital
13 — 2 Day Phantom of the Opera
13 — 23 Day California
13 — 19 Day Oriental Experience
14 — 8 Day New England States
15 — 6 Day Smokey Mountain Magic
21 — 3 Day Lake Placid
22 — 8 Day Ozarks Mountain Country
26 — 3 Day Wheeling, West Virgina
27 — 13 Day Classic London & Pans
NOVEMBER
3 — 9 Day New Orleans & the Deep South
9 — 3 Day Buffalo & Rochester ...
- Shopping and Dining
16 — 3 Day Renfro Valley
23 — 3 Day Niagara Falls Festival of Lights
Mount Forest
(519) 323-1545
1-800-265-2131
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(519) 348-8492
Owen Sound
(519) 371-3281
Listowel
(519) 291-4100
4 THE RURAL VOICE
THE MID-LIFE CRISIS:
ARE YOU UP FOR IT?
The month of July this year shoved
me right into another era of living.
Middle age. The birthday cards were
stark reminders. The most unusual of
the lot was a musical one. When
pressed on a certain spot, it played a
tinny version of "The old gray mare,
she ain't what she used to be."
Everyone knows that when one
reaches middle age one has to go
through a crisis. To be honest, I am
a bit apprehensive about it. Will this
crisis attack me when I'm not look-
ing? Will it jump out at me from the
towel cupboard? Super Wrench is a
year ahead of me in experiencing
middle age, so I asked him if he'd
gone through anything horrendous
during the first year of middle age.
He just chuckled. "You've been
going through a farm crisis," he
patiently explained, "which is your
mid-life crisis. Instead of maintain-
ing what we've built for the past
twenty-five years, we're building it
all over again, with older bones.
That's your crisis. The question is,
are we up for it?"
The more I thought about it, the
more sense he made. The farming
crisis has placed a lot of farmers back
into the same position they were in a
generation ago. Working off the farm
to save enough to buy land and
building the farming dream at nights
and on weekends. 1-le's also right
about questioning whether we're up
for it. The level of energy we took for
granted in our twenties and thirties is
running at a lower level and what
should be a snap is now often a
backache.
Life is supposedly segmented into
three distinct groups. The tender
years, the silver years, and the golden
years. Somebody goofed. The middle
years for farmers right now should be
renamed the "iron" years. You need
plenty of it in your backbone to face
what has to be done.
Super Wrench claims many things
look different when viewed through
middle age.
The hay fields get bigger every
year and the bales get heavier. A fall
off the hay wagon means traction in-
stead of just a slight limp. The rows
in the garden triple in length when
you approach them with a hoe in your
hand.
The stairs leading to your bed
become longer and steeper. Getting
out of bed becomes a major chore
since the sun now rises earlier and
sets later. You know what works on
your body, because it hurts. If you
can't feel it, get it checked out.
You don't believe everything you
read anymore and you put on your
glasses so you can believe what you
see. Financial security is a fairy tale
written by Michael Wilson. Free trade
is a nasty rumour started by people
who want it all for as little as possible.
All-night parties are something
someone else goes to. New machin-
ery is always owned by someone in
the next county. Everyone else just
has a good welder and a chest full of
tools.
When he got done, I was sorry I'd
asked. Just to show him nothing like
that would ever affect me, I raced up
the stairs to get my shoes. I fell
halfway up. Those darn bifocals do
that to me every time!O
Gisele Ireland, from Bruce County,
began her series of humorous columns
with The Rural Voice. Her most
recent book, Brace Yourself, is
available for $7 from Bumps Books,
Teeswater, Ontario, NOG 2S0.