Every now and then, my husband will come into the house, peer into my office from a distance — where I’m either working on the computer, the mending pile or the pile of bills to pay, and ask if I’m busy.

There are probably days he feels like he really stepped into a pile of something after asking me that.

It’s probably been true for generations that the work that happens in the house doesn’t seem as noticeable as that which happens outside on the farm. Anyone who lives on the farm can tell you how bloody physical and difficult that work can be.

But it isn’t to say that the work that happens in the house isn’t just as grinding.

Have you ever cleaned up after someone has gotten sick (regardless of which end is on the loose)? Have you ever rinsed out a fully loaded cloth diaper in the toilet? Or sewed a Christmas pageant costume at the last minute? Or hauled wet clothes to the clothesline? Or endured snarky teenage girls? Or canned while other commitments were waiting?

Have you ever embarked on cleaning up dinner quickly, then dropped a nearly empty jar of spiced beets — and cleaned that juice from the walls of the four rooms it flew into, and mopped or scrubbed the same juice from the floors in those same four rooms?

Ask me how I know about that … and about being late for an appointment.

Still, I’m certain it would look questionable as to whether I’m busy if I’m sitting at the computer, not typing. Not typing means I’m thinking of what to write, so it probably would appear that I’m sleeping with my eyes open — which has been known to happen. And if I’m paying bills, balancing the checkbook or mending, well of course those jobs can always be interrupted to help my husband for a “few minutes” that turns into an hour or two.

Still, I can understand my husband’s confusion over what appears to mimic the notion of “working hard.” His work outside involves enormous amounts of physical involvement and insurmountable stamina, technical and mechanical abilities. All those skills are carried out in whatever environment Mother Nature decides to dole out on a given day. I’ve seen him pile on the clothing so he could go outside to do sheep and hog chores, only to have to remove his gloves in sub-zero temperatures to repair the hog waterer.

I’ve seen him plant and harvest in some of the longest and coldest days known to mankind. I’ve seen him fix the swather or baler in such heat and humidity that it drips from his forehead, nose and chin all at the same time — and yet he just keeps on doing the work because it needs to be done.

Farmers amaze me that way.

Still, hard work continues to look different wherever we compare it.

I often think of how the woman of the farm carries herself from summer into the new year. She balances a lot — a full- or part-time job most often; getting the garden from outside and into jars on basement shelves; helping with harvest (either with harvest equipment or bringing supper); followed by scale ticket fine-tooth-combing; tax pre-plan preparation, Thanksgiving (planning, invitations and cooking), followed by the enormity of Christmas (shopping, scheduling/invitations, card sending, baking, gift wrapping, decorating, social gatherings and so much more).

She’ll follow all of that by collapsing in a dark closet on Dec. 26 (after work) with leftover chocolate star cookies and a huge bottle of wine. No wonder New Year’s Eve seems like such a non-event to her.

She’s exhausted.

Everyone’s hard work contributes to the cause. My mom can attest to that. One day after Dad retired, Mom was changing the sheets on the bed. It must have appeared to be an effort, as Dad confessed, “I didn’t know it took so much work to put the bed together.”

Mom replied, “I had five beds to change every week when the kids were all home.”

Dad was probably too busy paying for land and equipment, and keeping my brothers out of trouble with tractors, hog chores, shovels and pitch forks to see at the time that Mom’s hard work counted, too.

But I thank heaven for Dad’s hard work … and for Mom’s clean showers and sheets.

Hard work is hard work, no matter what it looks like.

Karen Schwaller writes from her grain and livestock farm near Milford, IA. She can be reached at kjschwaller@outlook.com. Note new address.