It's spring

Spring in the Heartland is uniquely ours.

Six white Charolais calves come gamboling out into the meadow kicking up their heels, shaking their heads, joyful and ready to play.

Soybeans lie waiting under the rich dark earth. Soaking or sleeping, they will pop their tiny heads up when the time is right and pour the nitrogen back into the earth for the corn that will follow in other years.

Corn also lies under the surface. Quaking. Terrified that it will drown if the water is too deep, or stays too long, but eager to grow too and send its golden ears up into the air, listening to the wind sussuring across the prairies of old.

Barbed wire fences. Ancient red barns. Modern mills and million dollar equipment stand side by side where once the grass stood five feet tall as far as the eye can see.

The rare free range chicken vies with the mice and birds for cover when the red tailed hawk swoops in and snakes patrol the earth in symbiotic work.

It is an ancient process blending into the scientific ways of today.