In an unusual year, farmers found gratitude in the familiar things. Despite all the challenges caused by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, work in the fields and pastures provided a sense of normalcy for many farmers.

Some farmers saw dry conditions that affected yields and limited forage growth, although for many farmers it was a successful year with some good yields.

ANTHON, Iowa — Joe Collins was running a combine 10 miles south of here when he got the page that a field fire was moving rapidly in the area.

“I got the page and I had no truck, so I had to call for someone to come get me,” he says. “I went to the top of the hill and I could see the flames several miles away.”

WALNUT, Ill. — Ron Pierson got a little help from a neighbor, Rob Wangelin, with a project on his northwestern Illinois farm this summer.

“He had a truck and was willing to help,” said Pierson, who knew he would be able return the favor another day.

It has certainly been a crazy year.

The crushing impacts of COVID-19, civil unrest and political upheaval have driven some to look for lighter outlets — but it’s hard to find a bar, restaurant or event that hasn’t been shut down.

After a catastrophic storm left his farm in disarray, Don Beatty had to get his family together and start assessing the damage.

On Aug. 10, a derecho with winds of more than 100 miles per hour unexpectedly blew through Iowa, leaving Beatty’s farm near Atkins, and others like it, with significant building and crop damage. In some cases, entire fields were blown over and many grain bins were ripped right off their foundations.

GARWIN, Iowa — This is the story of a barn. But because every story about a barn is also about a farm and about a family, it is about those things as well.

And it begins with a fire.

Father Matthew Flatley is a former pastor of four small Catholic rural parishes in Vienna, Brinktown, Koeltztown and Argyle, Missouri. Flatley has also served as the priest moderator for rural life in the Diocese of Jefferson City.

He answered some questions about what this year has been like for churches and rural communities during the pandemic, and how they are still finding reasons to be thankful in this Thanksgiving season.