Category Archives: Columns

Pork Chop Day wasn’t for Dad

April 3, 2021Columnssusanmanzke

Back in the Great Depression, people in cities often raised what we consider farm animals.

This short essay by my dad, Chuck Paska, is about raising pigs.

Dad wouldn’t touch the meat from the pigs he bottle fed from birth. Rabbits were also off his menu.

Grandma couldn’t understand her son. She was giving him good, healthy food to eat, but my dad would rather go hungry.

I raised ducks and chickens in my youth. When it came time to harvest some of my ducks — Grandma Jo wanted to make czarina, which is a soup made from duck blood — those ill-fated ducks left our home alive. I tried to block the rest from my thoughts. I would never eat that soup. I guess I took after my dad.

Bob’s past winter work

March 31, 2021Bob, Columns, worksusanmanzke

Without a heated machine shed, farm projects waited for spring and warm weather. That meant winter was a time for things needing doing inside the house.

The list was long and we knew that everything wouldn’t get done. So the most pressing was attacked. This is about the one project Bob tackled.

If we were lucky the house project would be finished before spring or it wait until another winter came our way. This time the bathroom work was finished in time.

Will it or won’t it leak?

March 30, 2021Columns, Odds and ends, Susansusanmanzke

I loved our waterbed especially in the winter as it was heated.

Yet there was always the possibility of springing a leak, which had me a bit nervous especially when the kids were bouncing on it.

I don’t know if it was a premonition or just fear of what could happen but the idea of leaks kept me vigilant.

We kept that waterbed for many years and even got a second one. Yes, we did have a couple of issues, but I would use one again. If I did have one, I wouldn’t want to get out of its warmth on a cold winter day.

It’s not fun being a number

March 27, 2021Columns, Odds and ends, Susansusanmanzke

Every time you turn around a company is affixing a number to you. We are not people. We are numbers: phone numbers, credit card numbers, account numbers.

This reading is how I felt when treated like a number.

Things have not gotten better over the years. We continue to be numbers.

I revolt against being a number. What about you?

Bob could never relax

March 24, 2021Bob, Columns, worksusanmanzke

It was January, Bob had no farm work and he was on vacation from the canning company. Of course, he couldn’t sit still. There had to be a project that needed doing. Housework didn’t count.

He found a window that needed fixing. I was drafted to drive tractor and … Well you’ll have to listen and find out what Bob had me doing.

Lifting Bob in a tractor bucket wasn’t fun, but somehow he found chores that needed me driving and raising him up.

I always held my breath doing this kind of work with Bob. I also had my fingers crossed.

Susan Manzke

Writer, Speaker, All-Around Good Person