Country Bumpkin?

Hey look, there's a tractor, my friend indicated pointing.  'That's not a tractor, its a swather,' I answer taken aback at her ignorance.  That was quite some time ago in those good old high school days.   

Now I understand that knowledge to a large extent is a reflection of exposure and having grown up on a farm there were things that I simply knew.

Milk came from cows (not the grocery store in a carton).  Vegetables grew in the ground.  The difference between hay and straw.  Ham comes from a pig's hindquarters and basic farm machinery such as a plow, cultivator, etc. were things a part of every day language.  Organic eggs meant that the chickens scratched around in their own excrement in a larger combined pen, as opposed to a cage, and the eggs were often seasoned with a little bit of roaster 'seed'.  'Organically grown' meant that natural fertilisers were used and it came out of the back end of some living creature. 

We had a word too for that at our house, and it wasn't 'organic fertilizer.'   

"Good clean shit," my father would call it.   

Bless those who are involved in the marketing process: 'organic fertilizer' eh?     

And growing up in the country made us the bumpkins (dull-witted / not so bright)?  I think not. 

Currently living in a city, there are days when I get reminders that, yes indeed, sadly, I am raising a city slicker for a child.   

'Those mice are so cute,' my daughter tries to tell me a statement to which my mind simply refuses to accept.  'Mice are not cute,' I retort, trying to teach her the basic fundamentals. 

Damn rodents.  Don't these kids learn anything these days? 

Funny thing is that when I grew up, we took a lot of flack for coming from a farm, going to school in the city.  And there was a time that a part of me thought that maybe I was missing out not having grown up in town. 

But watching my daughter's childhood and all the adventures that she is missing out on like the canal swimming, forts in the haymow, watching the growth of baby animals, playing in the hayfield, tag in the corn field..., etc.  I am truly sorry that she is growing up in the middle of the city.   

So with the luxury of hindsight, I would like to say to all you city slickers, Country Bumpkin?  Seriously...? 

I am inclined now to conclude that all that flak was simply a cover... 

City Simpletons.