Three barrels arrived ruined in August. They were not ruined. I simply did not yet know what they were for.
Years later, her daughter would read that line.
Yes.
She eventually had a daughter.
Then a son.
The daughter preferred horses to dairy.
The son liked numbers more than cows.
Neither became replicas of their parents.
Good.
The homesteader never told them hardship automatically made people better.
Sometimes hardship made people bitter.
Exhausted.
Cruel.
Afraid.
What mattered was what they chose with whatever hardship left behind.
Her daughter once asked:
“Did you know the cheese would work?”
“No.”
“Then why did you dump the third barrel?”
The homesteader thought.
“Because the first two showed me enough to test the possibility.”
“That sounds less exciting than the story.”
“It usually is.”
“Were you scared?”
“Yes.”
“Did you think you might lose the farm?”
“Every day.”
“Then why didn't you sell when the merchant offered five hundred dollars?”
The homesteader smiled.
“Because by then I knew why he wanted it.”
“What if the railroad changed route?”
“Then I would have had a very expensive lesson.”
Her daughter frowned.
“So you gambled.”
“Yes.”
“Was that smart?”
“I don’t know.”
Her daughter looked dissatisfied.
The homesteader laughed.
“Adults hate admitting that too.”
Her son later asked something different.
“Did you forgive him?”
“The merchant?”
“Yes.”
She thought.
“I stopped organizing my decisions around him.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It is mine.”
The boy nodded.
Perhaps one day he would understand.
Forgiveness did not always arrive as warmth.
Sometimes it arrived as irrelevance.
The person who once controlled your thoughts simply stopped.
The southern field remained.
Trains crossed nearby.
The loading platform expanded.
Land values climbed.
The homesteader leased part of the boundary for storage rather than selling.
Steady income.
The merchant had wanted quick control.
She preferred slow income.
Years later, the lease paid more than his largest offer would have.
That amused her.
Not because she had foreseen it.
She had not.
Luck deserved its share of credit too.
Another thing success stories often erased.
Rain.
Railroad decisions.
A boarding-house shortage.
A creamery owner willing to trade.
A doctor willing to write.
A driver willing to work.
An inherited recipe.
Luck.
Skill uses luck.
Skill does not create every opportunity.
The homesteader taught her children that.