We visited neighbors the other day and were humbled by their hardiness. Primrose baked apple donuts to bring her teacher and we doubled the recipe for Harold and Mary Jo. Every time we drive by their house Primrose says, “When are we going to visit Harold and Mary Jo?” and Marlena says, “There is Harold and Mary Jo’s house.”

The thing is, we respect, admire, and love Harold and Mary Jo. But I think that we are slightly intimidated by them, at least I know that I am.

Harold is 80 and Mary Jo is right around the same age. They moved to their off-grid log cabin around six or seven years ago after selling their farm in either Missouri or Wisconsin. I know they lived in both places and farmed in both places but I can’t remember which one was the most recent. Harold made a living as a dairy farmer. Mary Jo was a nurse. They have four children who are now grown with children of their own. They had enough acreage to grow hay for their cattle and to have free-range land for grazing. Harold is a real-deal farmer, one of the farmers that you read about in children’s stories. They raised about everything you could imagine on their farms. Goats, pigs, sheep, cattle, ducks, chickens, quail, rabbits, fruit, and vegetables. I am sure that I missed some.

Harold and Mary Jo moved here because two of their children moved to our road. Their daughter is a traveling veterinarian with two daughters and their son is a John Deere certified mechanic, a quiet builder, a farmer, and a deep thinker of profound skills.

In the time they have been here, they have transformed their property from an unfinished, empty log cabin to a beautiful log home with two additions, a shed barn, a chicken coop, a high tunnel, a large fence for cattle, a good-sized solar array, a generator shed, a prolific garden, and a hard-work ethic.

Harold’s garden puts everybody’s garden in the neighborhood to shame. Every time we drive by in the summer he is outside holding a hoe with his gnarled hands that are swollen at the knuckles. Not a weed in sight. He raises and butchers rabbits, meat birds, turkeys, and chickens. He keeps some sixty laying hens and sells eggs by the dozen to neighbors. Mary Jo preserves dozens and dozens of jars each season, also making huge batches of sauerkraut. She makes her own noodles to use the abundance of eggs, for God’s sake. Almost every time we drive by their beautiful log home, their children are there visiting with them. They had a grandson live with them for sometime until he made enough money working for Dibble Creek to buy his own land cash to build a cabin. They had a daughter-in-law move over from Moose Pass to stay with them while she worked as a nurse practitioner in Homer and searched for a winter rental to open up.

I write this because I admire Harold and Mary Jo. I do not know what they have done to raise a family that is so close, but I dream of doing the same. Harold offers rides, food, freezer space, and money to neighbor’s who others scoff at, myself included. Mary Jo keeps a specific type of tea in the house just for a certain visitor who only drinks that one brand. Harold bakes a loaf of bread for a lady every week because she asked for it. One time she said, “You know Harold, this week I’m going to need two loaves.” He told me that he shrugged his shoulders, and doubled the loaf. I asked him once what he did to raise kids that are so successful and to have a family that is so close. He thought for a while and then said, “Don’t ever interrupt a kid when they are working.” And that was all. I asked him once how he stayed married for fifty years. He said, “I asked my aunt one time the same thing after her sixtieth anniversary, and she said, ‘I learned when to sit down and shut up.’ I think there’s something to that.”

When we showed up uninvited to their house the other day, Harold was wearing a pair of house shoes that were covered in duct tape. Mary Jo pulled out a bowl of cookies that gave our family free rein. Needless to say, we didn’t stay long because the kids went crazy. We spoke of winter, the cold, the cabin fever, the neighborhood news, the spring. They mentioned how their shower drain had frozen and how the lip of the shower was high enough that they could take a shower and scoop out the water with a plastic container to run down the sink. They didn’t seem bothered by it in the least bit. They laughed about it and shrugged their shoulders.

We have a saying in our family based on the little bracelets that Christians used to wear back in the day. WWJD. For us, it’s WWHD. “What Would Harold Do?”

When it seems like the country is being overrun by wimps who hide behind keyboards, by political activists who want to burn the place down, by broken-hearted news stories about the newest wars, and by multi-million-person cities without regard for human life; people like Harold and Mary Jo remind us that kind, hardy, hard-working, neighborly folks still exist. They set the bar very high, I hope that more of us young folks can follow suit.

After we returned home that day, I cut the top off a plastic apple juice container and hand scooped the five gallons of water/anti-freeze mixture from the tub. It had been frozen for weeks and we were bathing in a small galvanized tub in the living room.

Why had we gone weeks with a frozen tub without even thinking about hand scooping it?

Two days ago, thanks to a warm spell, our bathtub drain unfroze. Harold and Mary Jo’s did not, and I don’t think it’s bothering them in the least bit.