I was recently with some people who were talking about the convenience of services such as UberEats and DoorDash, the companies that pick up your preordered food at a restaurant of your choice and deliver it to your door. They were talking about how these services have changed their lives for the better.

Another farmer and I were listening to the chatter when one of them turned to us and asked if we have DoorDash in our area. My fellow farmer very wisely answered, “The only door dash we have on the farm is when someone calls to tell us the cows are out.”

We all got a good laugh, but there is a lot of truth in that comment. Rural living comes with a lot of benefits, but amenities that relate to delivery services are not necessarily one of those perks. Our small town has two pizza places and one of them does deliver to the farm, but there is not a variety of options outside of their menu. Every once and a while I see the delivery car driving through the farm, trying to pinpoint the employee who ordered the Philly cheesesteak, but it is not a common occurrence.

I do rely heavily on delivery services to bring us many personal and farm necessities. Mega-centers, which are great for one-stop shopping, are 40 minutes from our dairy, so that requires a bit of planning before we decide to hit those stores. I need to justify the time, miles, and energy to make that trip.

Amenities in rural areas impact our personal lives and our dairy operations. I know there are parts of the country where small town businesses have struggled to stay alive. It is not always easy for farmers to get parts and supplies. Sometimes we are frankly told that we need to order online.

Outside of machinery parts, Amazon has certainly changed the flow of goods to rural areas. With a bit of planning, most of what I need can be sent to my doorstep in a matter of days. No, I am not dashing to the door for my food, but I can, after a few days of waiting, dash to the door for my packaged goods that I ordered.

Delivering items to a farm comes with its own set of issues, especially when farms have a ton of drop-off spots. Most likely, the house stuff goes to the barn, and there are times that the barn things end up at odd places near the houses. There are also times that my daughter and I cannot find our boxes and, lo and behold, they have landed in a farm vehicle we can never catch up to.

My favorite time was when a driver called me, frantic that he could not scan the package. I didn’t know where he was until I heard cows bawling. He had to describe what he saw around him before I could figure out what area of the barn he was standing in as his scanner took him to the palpation rail. He was so confused, and I couldn’t stop laughing.

Evidently, the barn office was not close to the exact spot that the box needed to be scanned, and he could not clear it until he found the perfect point of delivery. I am not certain that he had experiencing a palpation rail on his bucket list, but it was checked off for him nonetheless.

Technology has been moving at rapid speed for decades. I remember it was a big deal to put a pipeline in the barn and retire the sputnik. I can still see my late grandmother shaking her head and asking, “What will they think of next?”

They have thought of a lot of ideas since we were dumping milk buckets into a small push tank that delivered the milk to the bulk tank. Although, at that time, the invention of a robot to clean the outside of the glass pipeline would have been appreciated.

It feels like the new ideas are happening faster today than in any other era. The times we are living in are amazing. Amenities we never thought of are now coming to fruition.

Each year, drones are used on farms more than ever before, and it probably will not be too long until drones will deliver food to us in the fields, out in the barn, or sitting on our back porch. I can imagine that is around the corner since there are some fast food places that are already delivering with driverless cars in certain cities.

We must figure out how and where our dairy farms fit in all this technology. I like packages brought to my doorstep, but not at the expense of my farmland, my animals, and certainly not at the expense of good quality food. Yes, it can be inconvenient when we do not have things at our fingertips, but living in the country outweighs the hassle.

If I must decide between the availability of all the things right beside me or having fields of crops, animals, and open space, I will always choose my farm life. It is okay if I need to drive a bit further for what we need. The ultimate comfort, satisfaction, and peace is already here on the farm. That comes from hard work, caring for the animals, and being content with what is available — and occasionally, dashing to the door to chase cows.