Summer Reruns -- Farmhouse memories

From July 28, 2009

This is the time of year when I most miss living in rural Iowa.

I was reminded of this while driving over the weekend to see friends and visit my parents, who still live in the home where I grew up on a gravel road a few miles from Belmond.

Summer has reached its peak. The countryside is overgrown in dark, late-July shades of green. Farm fields are bulging at their barbed wire and gardens are sagging under the weight of tomatoes and zucchinis. Late in the day, when a low sun cuts through summer's haze, the landscape goes from photo to painting.

It made me think back to the couple of years my wife and I rented a farmhouse in rural Story County. It was just Katherine and me and our dog. Nothing against our lovely children, but this is the sort of pre-child stuff that occurs to you around, say, hour two of a long road trip. Maybe after 62 rousing, youthful renditions of "John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt."

We lived in a house tucked so far into a grove of oaks that you couldn't see it from the road. The oaks opened onto farmland beyond the long lane. Behind the house, a hillside led to a creek.

We lived one full summer there, the first after we got married. We spent a lot of mornings walking in the grass barefoot with a cup of Joe while our dog ran free around the massive yard. We spent a lot of nights sipping beer and listening to music on the screened porch. There were sounds all around you don't hear as well in town -- frogs, crickets, owls and our neighbor's cattle.

Our neighbor/landlord once called his whole herd to the fence beside our house, while tipsily holding a dainty martini glass. "Come boss, come boss," he yelled between gin hiccups.

But let's face it. It wasn't all Currier and Ives. The house was mouse-central. They stored dog food in our shoes and left presents in every drawer. Raccoons lived in the porch roof behind our bedroom wall. They were nocturnal. We were not.

A small propane stove was supposed to heat the whole place. Not even close. It wasn't unusual to awake in winter to a main floor temperature in the 40s. Good news: Beer stacked in the living room stayed ice-cold. Bad news: The pipes often froze. And we probably could have lived without knowing what it smells like when an unlucky squirrel falls down the stove chimney.

When we found out child No. 1 was on the way, it was time to leave our shack/Shangri La. We moved to a busy street in town. I don't think our dog has ever forgiven us. I don't blame her, especially this time of year.