By Jim Hagarty
Funny the things that bring your dad to your mind.
My father was born in the farmhouse his father built and he spent his whole life on the farm. He left school at the age of 12 and spent all his days farming.
My dad farmed in the day when every farm was a “mixed” farm. There was every kind of livestock, every kind of crop. Cows, pigs, chickens, geese and horses. I don’t know about sheep and goats. I don’t think they made the cut.
But Dad was also a beekeeper. They kept the bees for the honey, of course, honey being the sweetener preferred by rural folk who used white sugar sparingly. Over the years, he developed an immunity to bee stings. I remember once, when we were outside working, how a bee landed on his arm and was obviously stinging him. Had this happened to me (which it did a few times) I would have gone into cardiac arrest. Dad didn’t even notice it. When I raised the alarm, he just swatted it away.
By the time I was old enough to be aware of anything, the beekeeping years were over. But for many years after, the strange-looking hives were still stacked beside the garage.
Dad kept up with the times and specialized in beef cattle. I wonder if he ever missed his barnyard menagerie.
For some reason, I was terrified of bees. They seemed to know this and sought me out for target practice. Mostly, I was terrified of pain and bees were masters at delivering that.
This spring, our iris plants have flowered like never before. I take my breaks during the day in a lawnchair next to them. The flowers are full of bees. Not honey bees, but bees nonetheless. They don’t bother me a bit. Sometimes they buzz my head to see if I am an iris and while there are probably lots of purple spots upon my noggin, they can’t be fooled. They soon retreat to the real thing.
I thought of Dad today while sitting beside the iris. Ironic to me now that I have lost my fear of bees. Even bumblebees which used to make me run in terror. I like sitting by the iris on warm spring days. I feel close to my father when I am there. His fearlessness around bees was just more evidence for me that he was the bravest man I knew.
Maybe I’m a little braver now too.
