We are without....

The past 17 hours has taught me something valuable. Don't ever leave home without your shopping list, AND IF you do have your list with you, for Pete's sake, look at it once in awhile.
Yesterday I had a couple of errands to run: some to purchase items, and one to just "check it out". In all of the running around, I forgot to look at the list.
The kids and I inherited a large portion of the ranch in South Dakota after my husband passed away. I say large portion because anything larger than my parents 20 plus acres is big to me, and anything over a section is just large. When I first started traveling to South Dakota, I would tell my family that we were in the middle of nowhere. We really were. I couldn't just "run errands to check something out". K-Mart, Wal-Mart, Penney's, and the Dollar Tree are considered big shopping..yes I love all, but love to visit a Victoria's Secret and Starbucks once in awhile. However, there was a CJ Banks there long before it hit Abilene.
The "ranch" itself is in a beautiful rolling hills area between Pierre (pronounced like the pier you fish off! Don't say it French style, you will be laughed into the river) and Rapid City. If there has been rain, you will find tall green grasses waving at you when the wind is blowing. You can hear the cattle chewing the grass if the wind is not blowing! The family has a trailer house that they have added to and it is just "home". That is all I can say. At first I had a few hang ups about being there. For example, we had a bathroom, but no septic tank. I was very disturbed that I could take a shower (dam water only), but had to go out side to use the outhouse if I needed to "go". I went through 2 full term pregnancies using that outhouse. Sometimes in the middle of the night. We got a septic tank the year after Kauy was born. Kelly never had that convenience. We also had no real drinking water. Kelly's mom has this machine that would filter and clean the water. It ran most of the time to keep up with us, but the water never tasted right to me. Kelly and I would haul jugs of water into the house and refill them at the neighbor's or in town when we went to church. Being that far out, and that far down in a gully, we didn't have but two good TV stations on a black and white set. (This was only 16 years ago). We could change cable cords and get a different station, but you never knew if the picture would be clear, snowy or show up at all. If it was windy.........get a book. Of course, you had to read your book outside or in the house with the fan blowing on you. The air conditioner was not an option (until I came in very pregnant one summer! Kelly blew a gasket because there was an unused air conditioner and a pregnant woman in the house. The pregnant woman was making more commotion than the old unit!) Nights however would get down right chilly, but that double bed (verses our queen at home) was just right for me. I loved being close! We had/have no telephone in the house, and no cell phone (bag phone too) could get reception that far down in the gully. So...get a book. I did lots of reading. I tried not to read too many of those "hot and heavy, heaving bosom, throbbing thigh" books since we had no air, but I would take them with me when I went to the neighbor's to swim.
When we cook, the whole house heats up. In the morning the east blinds are kept down, then after lunch, the east blinds come up and the west ones come down. There are flies that look like B-1 bombers and leave huge bb's under your skin when they bite. The mailbox is one mile straight up hill. NO JOKE! I start walking at least 3 weeks before I leave here so that I am not left behind half way up. The mail can be sent from Abilene on a Wed. and you might get it before the next Wed. afternoon, but of course at the ranch, you know that mailperson by name, you sit and chat when you see them. The neighbors might come by when we were out walking and in the back seat have fresh homemade donuts they were taking to the rest home or hospital. You always loved that because they were soooo good (who cared that you had just burned that many calories walking up that hill).
Now, let me explain that all the comforts of home were available several yards away, but I was embarrassed to have to go to the "big house" where Grandma and Grandpa Johnnie lived. I didn't want to be a "bathroom" hog. So, I would go over there only if I knew I was gonna need to sit a spell first. AND I would say that I needed to phone home, AND for privacy I would just use the cute pink phone in the bathroom! Yep...a phone in the bathroom! Loved it!!!! I would also thank them for the use of those two items by sitting in their air conditioned living room and watching Wheel of Fortune! In all honesty, I think I was the only one to really use the REAL bathroom....they even used the outhouse!
I said all of that to make this point. I have lived without a real bathroom. Used wipies to wash off because you don't want to run the water container at the top of the hill out of water too soon. I have lived without my TV, computer, videos(we finally got them a VCR in 1998), air-conditioned bug -free bathroom, my phone, my mail and the daily newspaper oh and the up to date weather information when there are huge ugly clouds overhead with bolts of nasty lightening shooting out and NO ONE cares! I have lived with swarms of flies, swarms of paint eating, biting grasshoppers, and some bats. Believe it or not, I love going there, just wish it was closer. BUT..................there is one thing (materialistic type thing) that I have discovered here in dear old Abilene, that I can not live without and it will wear your family into grunts, groans, fighting and tears. It is one of the things our anscestors did without at times, but I can't even think of a time I would hold it together if I didn't have this one thing. As a matter of fact....I forgot it, took it for granted, didn't look at the list and now.......I am without. Have been without. So I close with this question.
What is the one thing that would bring your family to tears if it wasn't there? What one item in your life would stress your family out if you didn't have it any longer?
I will tell you in the next blog.....this afternoon.....after I return from the store!