Several weeks ago, my editor and my wife joined forces to strongly suggest that I hire someone to do the morning chores while Maria is in India (she leaves on Sunday).

This idea shocked me, I was looking forward to proving that I could handle the farm by myself, just like i did for years in Hebron at the first Bedlam Farm. Rosemary Ahern, my book editor, said that wasn’t the point, the point was for me to have a strong creative experience of my own and focus on the book I’m writing for Simon and Schuster, “Lessons From Bedlam Farm.”

Maria enthusiastically endorsed this idea, it would be like an academic fellowship, she said. You could just get up and go to focus on your books and blog, let someone else haul hay out and shovel snow and more in the morning. Under the plan, I’d do the afternoon chores.

This sounds like Downton Abbey, I said, people doing chores on my farm while I am right there in the house. But that argument got nowhere, and I began to see the creative possibilities for me in this, pure creativity in the mornings, when I am at my creative sharpest Drop the ego, and just say yes, was the message. So I did.

(My next book “Talking To Animals,” is out in five months, you can pre-order it here from Battenkill Books and I will sign and personalize it for you.)

Only a fool would ignore these two powerful and intelligent women, they know me as well as anyone in the world. Okay, I agreed, I’ll find a keeper.

One person came immediately to mind: Cassandra Conety.

She is a vet tech who works at Cambridge Valley Vet, she has done message and laser work with Red and treated many sick dogs and cats from the farm. She has nerves of steel, is both competent and professional, and is utterly unimpressed by me. I know her well.

She agreed. Maria said I had a lot of reservations about this idea (can I really sit and work while somebody else is just outside doing my chores on my farm?), Cassandra asked only one question: “are the reservations about me?” No, we both said, nothing to do with you.

She came over to the farm on Sunday and talked about what would needed to be done. She was not the least bit fazed about it, but then, I have never seen her fazed. I have a lot of respect and admiration for Cassandra, she is solid and conscientious and loving. Cassandra grew up on a nearby farm, she is not faxed by any of it.

Fate is insanely crazy about Cassandra, she just melts when she sees her. Perhaps Cassandra will take her to work for the day, and give me a real break (just kidding.)

So Cassandra shrugged off my reservations, she didn’t wasted much time on them, walked around the house. She’ll bring firewood in if I don’t get to it in the evening, which I will.  She’ll run and work the dogs. She’ll clean the manure out of the barn.

I will be holed up in my study, cranking out some great literature with my Chai Tea, candles and bottled water.

Cassandra gave the place a thorough going over. She checked out the barn, walked around the pasture, examined the manure pile, the cat litter box, the wood shed. We agreed on a price, and she was gone, see you on the 13th, she said.

There are not many people I would be comfortable trying this experiment with. I still harbor suspicions that everyone thinks I’m too old and frail to do this stuff. I do see it makes Maria feel good on several levels. One is that I can really make some  headway on my books with Cassandra coming, the chores can be both time-consuming and tiring. The other, of course, is that there will be someone to keep an eye on me if I fall down, get bumped by a pony push things by shoveling snow. or get knocked over while hauling hay.

I’ve also asked Alfreda, who cleans out house once or twice a month, to stop by a couple of times while Maria is in Kolkata. I do not want her to come home to the kind of house Jon Katz would leave for her, despite his best efforts. I am a chaos machine.

I do think this idea is growing on me, I am excited about this very focused time to get over the hump with this book, which I love writing. Distraction is an issue for me. This is precious time, it is to be savored and appreciated, especially while Maria is so far away.

I see that people are beginning to worry how I will handle Maria’s being away for two weeks. I am nothing but excited about this trip. Of course I’ll miss her, and it will make for a great chapter in my book.

When I first posted this piece, Peggy on Facebook immediately said that it was better to have Cassandra than a Medic Alert button. She said she understood Maria insisting on Cassandra if I wasn’t willing to take steps to be safe. This kind of thinking, of course, is precisely why I was uncomfortable with the idea. It is easy to see it that way.

But Peggy is quite mistaken. I don’t need a Medic Alert button, and Maria would never insist I get one.

This is not about safety or danger, its about creativity.

Peggy missed the same thing I missed at first – Rosemary, who does not worry about my safety, saw a chance to encourage me to focus on my book, and so did Maria. That’s what a great editor does. This use of Cassandra to help me focus on my work is a creative gift and opportunity. It ought not to be confused with neurotic worry, the rising currency of social media. I am safe on this farm, as safe as I will be anywhere, and if I topple over and die here one day, what a great way to go.

Maria and I do not take responsibility for the others life, we do not put that on one another (except when it’s snowing and she drives off in that toilet bowl). We love each other, but we take care of ourselves.

So meet Cassandra, I could not do better for a keeper. She knows and loves animals and is herself a farm girl, and I am excited to add her to the wonderful cast of people who are part of my life. Cassandra is a no-bs person, she will come and do her work and vanish, but I will make sure to run out of my writer’s cave and get some photos of her. She’s part of the story now.