Dry Month

In "Gerontion," T.S. Eliot writes

Here I am, an old man in a dry month,
Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain.

I'm an old woman in a dry month (who can still read to herself), and I'm waiting for rain. How many weeks since we've had rain? Two? Three? I've lost count.


At Smith Farm, this field should be lush and green instead of short and brown. This is—was—one of our best hayfields. The grass should be higher than my knees.

It isn't as high as my shoe.


I don't know what farmers will do this year. Luckily, we got enough hay from the first cutting (the only cutting!) to feed my mares. We've lost money on the lime and fertilizer. We won't have hay for sale. Unlike many of my neighbors, though, we don't depend on the farm for our income.

I imagine that beef prices will drop in a few weeks as farmers thin herds they can't afford to feed. Next year, prices will rise because not much beef will be produced.

The dairy farmers are cutting silage that is already drying up—and the corn isn't high at all. How will they make it through the winter? What will happen to milk prices?

What will the horse people do? Will barns close because owners can't feed their boarders? Or will they raise boarding fees sky-high to import hay from elsewhere? Will horse owners on a small acreage have to sell stock that they can't feed? Horse prices will probably drop dramatically this fall.

My horses have almost nothing left to graze in the pasture. Thank goodness we made enough hay this spring.

I remember the drought of 2003. We had problems with our well—the mud tattooed the inside of the dishwasher and stained some of my clothes in the washing machine, but we never ran dry. But even in 2003 the fields weren't this bad.

Thoughts of a dry brain in a dry season.