by Jo Wardhaugh Doyle                                                        Ireland                                  27/09/2025

The farmer’s wife is secondary to the land, a mistress of sorts and most certainly during the summer months she not only feels this, but she also knows it. The farmer himself is a great man. He is a hard worker, the man who labors all hours and dreams of a good harvest, a prize bull, a great yield of hay, silage, straw, and a good price for the corn. Then you see a strutting walk, a puffed chest, a smile full of joy, shining, glowing, an exuberance of manly pride. It says look what I did this year.

“Isn’t it great Mary,” he’d sigh rubbing his head before putting back the lucky harvest cap. “I did well this year love.”

“You certainly did Dan.” Would be the yearly reply. “You certainly did my love, well done.”

She’d clean away the dishes and the table, while Dan shaved and washed by the sink saying he was off for a well-deserved pint. Mary would nod in agreement saying,

“Yes, well deserved indeed.”

Relief that at long last the misery of waiting for good weather was over. The heavens could throw open hailstones now for all she cared but these long summer months of listening that the corn might lodge, or the wheat might sprout, or it was cold or windy or the crows and rabbits would decimate the corn. There’s too much rain, there’s no sun, there’s too much sun, it’s damp, it’ll get all moldy before it’s dry enough. Then the corn gets cut and the sky opens, and you slowly watch as the golden straw starts blackening, just like the mood in the house. It’s more exhausting waiting for the weather than working like a youngster. It’s harder just listening to the woeful despair of himself, helpless in the face of the rain. But then the drying comes, the turning, the rowing up and bailing. The late nights are getting darker. Bailing before the damp hits the straw.

Cooking, baking, shopping, half rearing the grandkids, babysitting, storytelling. Rearing the few calves and weanlings, feeding the bullocks, minding the vegetable patch, cleaning the gutters, painting the fences, spraying the yard, entertaining the countless men all berating the rotten weather. Day in, day out, food on the table for the few, food on the table for the many. Cleaning the floor, doing the dishes, cooking supper. Doing his feet, so many calluses from these boots. Soaking the feet, clipping the nails like a farrier doing the horses hoofs. Checking the rash on the back of his neck. Taking the nasty blackthorn out of his hand. Injecting the bullock. Putting them all in the crush, dousing them for worms and lice, power hosing the crush down. Doing the books for the ministry of agriculture. Cooking dinner. Babysitting the grandchildren. Doing the washing, ironing, mopping the floor. Welcoming the helpers and listening to all their worries. Wishing them well in their work. Sending them off for their pint, picking up their dirty work clothes, putting the grandchildren to bed. Getting the roast out for tomorrow’s dinner, washing the spuds, chopping the carrots, baking a cake, cleaning away the mess in the kitchen.

Phone call.

“Can you pick me up love, I’ve had a few pints here and can’t afford bad luck now.” Collecting him and Paddy from down the lane, dropping him off whilst both men tell each other how wonderful they are at the marvelous work they’ve done. The farmers journal and local rag will have all the news of the difficult harvest, but how well they’ve done.

“We’ll need to be up early to move the cattle in the morning love, you don’t mind do you?” “I’ll be there.” Mary laughs.

Dans off to bed. Mary mops the floor, has a cup of tea, and watches the ten o’clock News as she missed the nine o’clock local news. The phone rings, her sisters wanting to talk. She has another cup of tea with a digestive biscuit then another. She wonders if she can ever retire from this and ponders only if he retires first can she rest. She takes her cholesterol and heart tablets and goes off to bed thinking ‘no retirement for me’: And a few pints down himself and he’s snoring like a pig trussed up for Sunday lunch, no sleep tonight.

Six o’clock, a quick breakfast. Move the cattle up to the slated shed, it’s so much easier for our zero grazer to get in. Check the calves and weanlings, in for breakfast for the young lad and a quick fry up. Clean the dishes away and get the roast on. Do the ironing, set the table for everyone to come. The day is young yet, plenty to do and now cut a bit of spanking fresh broccoli to go with the carrots and roasters. Set the table, call young Christie’s mum, and tell her he’s grand if he wants to spend another night with them. Dinner is ready. The men come in. A box of chocolates, a bunch of flowers, and an utter surprise for Mary. Gratitude all round.

The farmer’s wives I know do this and ten times more. They were never written about, acknowledged, rarely in their own house, never in their villages, and absolutely never by their government. Payment is zero, joint herd number rare, Ministry of Agriculture doesn’t account for them. Payment by no one. It is an old vocation, part of the marriage vows, the unsaid joint account of work. Farming in Ireland would collapse into a grief hole without these women, they are the backbone of this industry, mostly now in their seventies and eighties, they gave their lives to the service of the farm, the land, food production and dare I say the country. We’ll never see them up in Aras an Uachtarain .

The invisible, the unseen, the unacknowledged, the ones who seem to be worth less. No medals or awards, and if they’re lucky to have a good husband, a bunch of flowers and a meal out, or a little vase of forget me nots will suffice for them, because they are generous women, good women and maybe they are the last of their kind.