RUDIMENTS, pt. 912
(a rock thrown up on a barren field)
The soils of Vermont were
tough for plowing and planting.
Over 200 years or more, farmers
had been yearly piling up the
surface rocks that interfered with
the tilling - fences and property
lines were most often made
of them, in the cold, off-months
with little else to do but tend to
machinery and fences. It was a
rocky place to farm, but they'd
made it work. Whenever I was
up there, I was amazed by the
rock/debris I'd see in the fields;
rocks and such. In Pennsylvania,
by contrast, the soil was like
butter - if a comparison by
stretch has to be made.
-
Nonetheless, often times the
discs would get broken, on the
tilling of the soil. The cultivators
which were dragged by the tractors
would snag on rocks too - nothing
like Vermont, mind you - and
sometimes a disc, or a 'harrow disc'
would break off or get severely
damaged. It wasn't a disaster,
nor catastrophic, but farmers
would usually stop the show and,
being good welders, usually get
right to work at the barn workshop,
preparing and welding the repair.
No one ever started screaming or
hollering about a halt, or the damage,
or even just the simple mistake.
Those Pennsylvania farmer guys
weren't much like that. The ones
who got crazy or crotchety were
just laughed at, or seen as jesters.
-
It was always remarkable to see,
in these tool-rooms and sheds,
the sorts of implements these
farm guys had - most of the
farms having been turned over
generation from generation,
surprisingly too, often since
1803 or 1815, that era. Always
amazed me. There would be
saws and hammers and such
that, in the most simple and
conversant manner possible,
they'd rattle on about: 'This here
hammer head was forged by
Grandad, 4 generations back
back, when he was young. Oh,
'bout 1860 or so, maybe. Before
or after the War, I don't know.'
(Civil War). Then he'd go on
with whatever little tale he
knew about his forebear in that
war, what battle, how wounded,
and where, if that was the case.
They'd talk about the harrowing
trip back up north, after the war,
how things had just fallen apart
down there at war's end, and
they all were just mustered out
and told to go home - leaving
behind only the most imprecise
or vague paperwork for service
records, etc. The plow thing
was referred to, sometimes as
a harrow, oddly enough, and
to hear it again as 'harrowing
experience' of returning home,
sort of threw me. No one had
ever used that word to me
before, in any usage, and
there I was, experiencing my
own new time, way out in
Pennsylvania somewhere,
and learning of all this stuff.
-
Another weird thing. Rocks are
always heaving up, over decades
and more, they come out through
the surface, so that the field your
grandfather cleared, in 1918, by
1975 or so was showing new rocks
heaved up. BUT, if you put a rock
down in your yard or garden, in
a decade or so that rock is gone,
having been gobbled by the earth,
in a slow re-sinking. I could never
figure that out.
-
With the plow, cultivator and
harrow and all that, the idea was
to be thinking ahead - to the
field you wanted to put a crop
into that year. Sometimes the
fields sat, for a year or two;
sometimes they got used for
cow-pasture for four or five
years. The idea of good farming
was to keep an eye on all that
and keeping making sure your
fields were rotated and fresh.
Which is where that initial,
and early, harrowing and
turning would come into play.
You'd just go up and down
the rows, and this thing would
open up and flip the soil -
which you'd then let air-out,
to 'season' it for the planting
in a few weeks. (Another
amazing use of a word :
'Seasoning' for planting
season).
-
That was all a far better world
for me. I wished I was there.
I always felt there was too
much unsaid between people;
and that mostly just causes
disgruntlement, disagreement,
and unease. I know for me it
does. There's like an unending
frenzy of junk that people put
themselves through - holidays
and dinners, and group feeds
and all - which are fine for
them, if that's what they choose
to do - but which, for me, cause
great anguish and devilment.
Yes they insist on putting me
through it; each time. It merely
ends up in getting me there in
a foul and uncooperative mood,
mostly because I never own up to
my true feelings and just explain,
or try to explain, my plight to them.
I'm really a nice guy. I don't like
to eat publicly. The 'Seasonal'
stuff is meaningless to me. And
I truly dislike, and have no part
in, three hours of bland, sort of,
social-culture general babble,
TV talk, and comparison shopping
center talk. All with a huge TV
blaring on the wall. I just don't
live in that manner, it throws me
off, makes me nervous, and has
no context for me whatsoever.
I'm like a rock thrown up on an
already barren field.
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