When it has been cold and snowy all winter long, Midwesterners start to seek inspiration to get them through March and April. These are months of mud and brown. Some start looking for any green. A dandelion. Crocuses. I dream of a vibrant June hay field and the aroma of first crop alfalfa. At this point, I’d even settle for a heady whiff of second crop hay. Many from town enjoy the fragrance of newly mown grass, but honestly, it is anemic compared to the perfume of fresh cut hay.

If you have never paused along the edge of a recently swathed hay field, you should do so, and soon. Certainly, if rushed you can smell it just by rolling down your car window, when you happen to be driving by. But you really should stop, get out and walk over to a windrow to pull up a handful of drying grasses, clover and alfalfa. Really get your nose into it and inhale deeply. Only then will you begin to appreciate the compulsion that all farmers know. The need to imbibe a deep draught of sun cured hay. I know of no farmers who cut hay that can resist this urge. I have no knowledge of any farmers, relieved of their hay fever after transitioning to row crops of beans and corn, who do not annually lament the loss of their aromatic hay ground.

I wonder if the very first herdsmen, propped on their arched scythes after cutting native grasses for their stock, initiated this tradition. I wonder if they longed for the sweet smell of summer hay, as they apportioned their haystack to their cattle, sheep or horses during the harsh winter months of their native lands. I know I do.

Photo credit: Angie Anderson and my Brother, Kaleb on the family farm.