Recycling--Farm Style

Recycling, on a farm, has a whole different meaning than city-slickers definition of  gathering all their paper, plastic and glass and sorting it into the appropriate tubs.  Miss Fay can find more uses for items that normally I would trash, than any person I know!  Paper take-out bags become gift bags filled with fried pies, cool whip tubs become take-home containers for dinner leftovers, grass clippings become hay for the mules and horse; the list is endless (and perhaps because I'm hungry when I write this everything today seems centered around food).

One of the most ingenious, I saw the other day.  After our work is done for the day Hila Fay lives for us to pull out the old, duck-taped pool (which we recycled from the old house), fill it with ice-cold water from the hose, jump in with no aversion to the frigid temperatures and dance around with Aunt Lisa.  She'll play for a good half-hour, until her finger-tips wrinkle up and we pull her out.  Then we transfer the water to a fifty-five gallon barrel and make one more trip to the garden where we dip the water out bucket by bucket and quench the thirst of the tomatoes, beans, squash, potatoes and every other plant that looks the slightest bit droopy.

Recycling definitely takes on a new meaning out here.  In fact, it brings to mind the trendy phase that I see being tossed from the designer's mouths on tv, "re-purpose".  It tickles me a little, thinking that Miss Fay's way of life is now a popular craze!