On With the Shows

What I’ve been thinking about this week:

• Agricultural Shows.

• Fitting in.

Although I wasn’t at last week’s Highland Show, it has got me thinking about the three agricultural shows I’ve been to in my life. 

Around 1985 I attended the Yarrow Show in my Selkirk High School Band debut. That's me on second horn. I was very proud. 

Some 20 years later, I went to the Highland Show, which I’ve now been to twice. They were very different experiences. 

The first time was with my mum. It was a grand day out, with men shimmying up poles very quickly, sheep and cows with rosettes and impressive caber tossing. And a life-sized haggis…

Fast forward to 2019 and it was a completely different kind of grand day out. I’d just arrived back from a week in Majorca and was wondering how easy it would be to wheel my suitcase the mile or so from the airport to the showfield. Luckily, Ivie surprised me at Arrivals so we got there much quicker than if I’d had to find my own way. 

I have an appalling sense of direction, which is deeply ingrained in my DNA. There is much family folklore of Giblins being in the very wrong place at the wrong time but those are for another day. Suffice to say, I was once in Ohio when I thought I was in Pennsylvania. 

Anyway, we Ivie found the car with no trouble, I dumped my suitcase and in we went to the Show. 

Well, nothing had prepared me for being at an agricultural show with an actual farmer. I had assumed that he would want to have a close look at machinery at some point but I hadn’t bargained on going to each stand and being plied with free booze. They sure know their audience.

And then there’s the bumping into people. Obviously, I’m used to us bumping into someone Ivie knows wherever we go (including Tokyo, for goodness’ sake) but this was on a much larger scale. We couldn’t walk 50 yards without stopping to talk to someone about machinery, spread rates or something else farmery. There also seemed to be a lot of jokes without punchlines. 

Entrance to the market where we heard, "Hey, Ivie!" 🙄🙄🙄

Knowing people or in some cases, being related to them, also meant being led what felt like ‘backstage’. It was a whole new world of people rushing backwards and forwards while huge Clydesdales awaited their turn in the ring. I was hastily introduced to lots of people and handed another glass of wine. And then asked where I was from. 

There was some initial confusion that I wasn’t from a farm or from Wigtownshire but no-one seemed to mind and I kept being handed alcohol. (I may also have suggested that Ivie had exhausted his romantic opportunities locally so was forced to look outside the Shire for his next attachment…).

The story was much the same at Wigtown Show on the couple of occasions I’ve been - meet people, look at tractors and drink. It’s Ivie’s perfect day out, really, and these days, I don’t feel I have to stick around when the chat gets too farmery.

I even joined Wigtown Agricultural Society this week. I’m not entirely sure what it entails, to be honest, other than I won’t have to buy a ticket on the day. And now when people ask where I’m from, I can say The Spittal and they’ll know exactly where I fit into the world. 

On the Road Again

What I've been thinking about this week:

• Time off
• Technology (again)

As you'll probably remember, I work part-time. It's a privileged existence, having the option to choose time over money and being able to do pretty much what I please most of the time. 

This is in stark contrast to Ivie who, given the choice, works every day he's at home. Sometimes it can be difficult to feel that I fit in with someone who can't sit still when I manage that pretty well, thanks very much. 

Covid has had an impact on our ability to have days out, weekends away and proper holidays over the past 18 months or so. But November is a quieter time on the farm so it's easier to lure Ivie away. I like to think that I'm an alluring siren on the rocks rather than a harpie stamping her feet but you'd have to ask Ivie. On second thoughts.... 

Last week we headed away for a few days. We had a mix of AirBnBs in the middle of nowhere and drinking bottles of wine, and visiting a couple of friends and drinking bottles of wine.

Blue skies in Norfolk

It was a really relaxing break but it reminded me of all the little things that we miss out on doing together that I'd normally have taken for granted. (Getting up at 8am at weekends is considered a lie-in for goodness' sake.)

• Having a cuppa in bed and reading the paper (Ivie's first cuppa is after he's fed beasts). 
• Sitting around in your pyjamas and easing into the day (no chance). 
• Having uninterrupted time together that isn't puncuated by something giving birth, dying, being in the wrong field (or all of the above).

It sounds like I'm moaning but it actually made me appreciate our time away even more. There was a lot of driving involved so I put my big girl pants on and took a turn in the driver's seat.  

What you should know about Ivie's car:

• My car would fit in the boot. 
• It is far too fancy for its own good. 
• I secretly like it (heated seats, anyone?).

I won't bore you with all the things it can do at the touch of a button but suffice to say my luddite tendencies have been getting quite a workout recently. 

I'm making a concerted effort to practise driving it, though, so that I don't become one of those people that expects to be chauffeur driven everywhere and then forgets how to work windscreen wipers. 

It's so much more comfortable than my own car that I'm in danger of becoming like a teenager who has just passed their test and wants to drive everyone everywhere. It might cut down on those bottles of wine, mind you. 

Not a WAG

Things I know:

• I'm woefully unqualified to be a Farmer's WAG*
• That's ok

As I may have mentioned once or twice, I don't come from a farming background. I'm most definitely a townie and one without many lifeskills if I'm honest. 

I was quite nervous about meeting other WAGs when I first started seeing Ivie. I had visions of them all running around doing the farm accounts with one hand, feeding a pet lamb with the other, while waiting for yet another perfect Victoria sponge to come out of the oven. To be fair, I still think most of them could do this but luckily they don't seem to mind that I can't.

Not really a Victoria sponge

My first experience of WAGs was quite full-on. We were off to a Burns Supper where I knew exactly one other person in the room (Ivie) and he knew everyone (of course). I was hideously anxious. It was the first time I'd met Ivie's brother and sister-in-law (in the car on the way there so not exactly relaxed) and I was asking myself all sorts of stupid questions (in my head otherwise that would have been weird). 

• what if everyone thinks my dress looks stupid?
• what if they think I'm not good enough for him?
• what if they think he should be with someone who went to Young Farmers?

Not really a pet lamb

Obviously, the answer to all of these questions is the same: there was too much booze for anyone to care.

For the non-farmers, let me say something about Young Farmers. Before I was with Ivie, I thought it was just where young folk went to ensnare meet their significant other and learn quite fixed gender-based skills: baking and sewing for the girls; drinking and fighting for the boys. Now I know that's not really the case. The young men and women involved in YF around here are involved in all sorts of things, including public speaking, stock judging and raising the positive profile of farming. Here endeth the lesson.

I headed for the bar and was immediately flanked by two women. Let's call them Nic and Barbara for argument's sake. The conversation went something like this:

Nic (in one breath): "You must be Rebecca. We're Nic and Barbara. What are you drinking? Red wine? Let's get a bottle."

The women reading this will nod in agreement when I say that women can be absolutely magnificent to other women and it's bloody marvellous. 

Suffice to say, my anxiety faded. I drank and I laughed and I laughed and I drank. And that's pretty much been my experience of WAGs ever since. 

* WAG = A Wife or Girlfriend, usually of a sports player with a high profile and glamorous lifestyle

Not really a WAG