Farm and ranch women are the heart of an important American institution, agriculture. Their strength is a critical resource for their families and communities. This book offers those women their own special prescription for health and well-being in one hundred small doses. Some "capsules" remind of care to be taken daily, some to be taken regularly, others to take as needed, several to give to family and friends and still more to apply to the community. Reading this book won't make you immediately "feel good" like a warm beverage or a serving of your mother's best meal. It won't always bring a tear of nostalgia to the eye or a longing for the good old days. But like a good tonic, these capsules of advice and encouragement will stimulate you. You'll find essays that will boost your morale. Others will prompt you to be grateful. Several instruct about health matters. And some will even make you laugh. There's no better prescription than that, is there? Teddy Jones, R.N., Ph.D., is a Family Nurse Practitioner. Before she and her husband began farming his family's land near Friona, Texas, she was a Professor at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center School of Nursing, in Lubbock, Texas. Growing up in a rural town in central North Texas, she spent lots of happy times with cousins on their families' wheat and dairy farms. Those experiences and her admiration for those who farm and ranch prompted her to develop and teach elective courses in Rural Health Nursing. That same interest spurred her to develop the concept for her health promotion column, "In The Middle Of It All," which appears monthly in "The Farmer Stockman." She practices part-time as a Nurse Practitioner in New Mexico and writes when she's not helping with the farm work. Sue Jane Sullivan, B.S.Ed., teaches in the only school in the only town in Borden County, Texas. That rural school is not far from the area where she grew up, surrounded by ranches, farms and oil wells. Like most people in farming and ranching areas, she can and does fill many roles. She teaches English, Spanish, history and government and coaches Interscholastic League literary events including debate, journalism, and spelling. She's a free-lance newspaper writer and her newsletter, "A New Song," is a regular source of encouragement for the special group of friends for whom she publishes it. A major inspiration for her work is her maternal grandmother who was widowed at 41, during the Great Depression. She managed to keep and operate the family farm and raise five children long before the term single parent was invented.
