It seems that's what the heifers on our farm think they have, open range priviledges. Yesterday morning while bedding the stalls, a neighbor stopped by, not for a visit but to let us know we had some heifers out. We chased them through the freshly planted corn field and got them back in, fixed the hole and went on about our business. After an evening of chores and a double header that had a 45 minute rain delay, we dropped into bed later than normal only to hear the phone ring. It was another neighbor calling to let us know their were some heifers out! We rolled back out of bed, headed out in the pitch black darkness, of course it was cloudy, no moonlight to illuminate the cornfield and I drove the truck while Big Daddy got his exercise. When we got them back to the barn, I opened the door only to allow the rest of the heifers and the horse out. As I began to mutter bad things under my breath about how stupid those heifers were acting and something about wishing I had a shotgun, one heifer shot back through the barn door and all the rest followed her. A big sigh of relief came as I slid the barn door closed and headed back up to the house. My bed never felt better.
It was a situation I glossed over. I didn’t have to deal with it every single day but it was often enough for me to go to my Bible study group and submit it as a prayer request. They would listen to me and invariably one or two of them would tell me, “You’ve got to take care of that. Get rid of it.” I knew I should, but I didn’t want to face the conflict and I was fearful of the consequences. Life would not be the same. I would have to find other avenues to fill the void that the resolution would create. So instead of facing it once and for all, I worked around it. I figured out ways to deal with it. My work was suffering because of it, but I kept making excuses that it would get better over time. If I just kept feeding the monster, it would be satisfied, and things would work out. But that’s not what happened. I had sleepless nights of worry; I was short-tempered and spent a lot of time wringing my hands and waiting for a better result. Before you start ...
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