Does "Haste Make Waste"?

By Mrs. A. J. Wilder.

A few days ago, with several others, I attended the meeting of a woman's club in a neighboring town. We went in a motor car, taking less than an hour for the trip on which we used to spend 3 hours, before the days of motor cars, but we did not arrive at the time appointed nor were we the latest comers by any means. Nearly everyone was late and all seemed in a hurry. We hurried to the meeting and were late. We hurried thru the proceedings; we hurried in our friendly exchanges of conversation; we hurried away and we hurried all the way home where we arrived late as usual.

What became of the time the motor car saved us? Why was everyone late and in a hurry? I used to drive leisurely over to this town with a team, spend a pleasant afternoon and reach home not much later than I did this time and all with a sense of there being time enough, instead of a feeling of rush and hurry. We have so many machines and so many helps in one way and another, to save time and yet I wonder what we do with the time we save. Nobody seems to have any!

Neighbors and friends go less often to spend the day. Instead they say, "We have been planning for so long to come and see you, but we haven't had time," and the answer will be: "Everyone makes the same complaint. People don't go visiting like they used to. There seems to be no time for anything." I have heard this conversation, with only slight variations so many times that I should feel perfectly safe to wager than I should hear it any time the subject might be started. We must have all the time there is the same as always. We should have more, considering the time saving, modern conveniences. What becomes of the time we save?

The reason oftenest given for not joining the Ruralist Poultry Club, by the girls I tried to interest was that they hadn't the time. Their school duties, their music and the like kept them so busy that there was no time for a new interest. There was one pleasing exception. Lulu was hesitating about sending in her application for membership and when I inquired if she lacked time for it I found that she was already leaving all the time necessary to the care of the poultry and that she had an incubator of her very own already at work hatching eggs for a purebred flock.

Then I inquired if the record keeping was what made her hesitate and learned that she already kept most minute records of expense and income and of every egg laid. Not only this, but she keeps her father's farm accounts and in good condition, too. Here was a girl with time and ability enough to have a business of her own and to keep track of it and of her father's also. I think it was really shyness that made Lulu hesitate about joining the poultry club. She did send in her application at last and it was too late, but if the girls in the club to not hustle I feel sure this outsider will beat them, except for the prizes.

If there were any way possible of adding a few hours to the day they could be used handily right now, for this is surely the farm woman's busy time. The gardens, the spring sewing, the housecleaning, more or less, caused by the change from cold to warm weather and all the young things on the place to be cared for call for agility, to say the least, if a day's work is to be done in a day.

Some people complain that farm life is monotonous. They surely never had experience of the infinite variety of tasks that come to a farm woman in the merry springtime! Why! the ingenuity, the quickness of brain and the sleight of hand required to prevent a young calf from spilling its bucket of milk at feeding time and the patience necessary to teach it to drink is a liberal education in itself, while the vagaries of a foolish sitting hen will relieve the monotony for the entire day.

So much of the work of the farm that we take as a matter of course is strange and interesting to a person who is not used to it. A man who has been in business in town for over 20 years is moving his family to the farm this spring and expects to be a farmer. The old order, you see, is reversed. Instead of retiring from the farm to town he is retiring from town to a farm. I was really surprised, in talking with them, to find how many things there are for a beginner to learn.

Mrs. A. J. Wilder. "Does 'Haste Make Waste'?" Missouri Ruralist,  (April 20, 1917): page 16.

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