Cousin Allison’s wedding dance had reached the point where the women were discoing to Village People songs, small kids were roaming the hotel ballroom like a pack of wolves, and Allison’s father had cut off the flow of free liquor.
“I got to the bartender just in time,” said Dale Hanson’s nephew Mark, almost spilling an over-loaded tray of rye and cokes as he set it down on the corner table where Dale and his son Jeff were nursing their drinks and watching their wives dance. Mark was just a few years older than Jeff, but since his farm was a two-hour drive north of Hanson Acres, Dale and Jeff usually only saw him at family events.
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“Who holds a wedding in Saskatoon in February?” Mark asked. “The bride could’ve at least given us an excuse to go to Mexico.”
“I had a winter wedding,” Jeff reminded him. “It was -37. Elaine’s flowers froze solid.”
“Oh, yeah, that’s right,” Mark said. Jeff didn’t bother taking offence. Mark often forgot to think before he talked, especially when there was an open bar.
“Made your seeding plans?” Mark asked, settling into a chair.
Dale nodded, and Jeff answered, “Mostly.”
“Canola pencils in pretty good,” Mark said. “Of course, I need to plant a bit of wheat, since I signed some contracts to celebrate the death of the wheat board. But mostly I’m planting canola.” Mark finished his drink and chose another from the full tray. “Help yourselves,” he said.
“Thanks,” said Dale. “Didn’t you seed a fair bit of your farm to canola last year?”
“Sure did,” Mark said. “But it makes me the best money. And I’ve got to make payments on that new combine.”
“I heard about that,” Dale said.
“Yeah,” Jeff told his dad. “Mark sent photos.”
“I was thinking,” Dale went on, “you must be pushing your rotations a bit, with so much canola.”
“It’s not hurting anything,” Mark said. “My yields have been going up these last few years.”
“You’re not having any trouble with disease? Weeds?”
“Nah. Those guys who push that stuff just want to limit supply. And keep my profits down. Jeff agrees with me. He said so last month at Uncle Ed’s funeral.”
“Is that right?” Dale said, looking over at his son. Jeff looked away, just in time to spot his toddler at the tail end of the pack of kids on their way to raid the midnight lunch table. The little boy sneaked a look over his shoulder at his dad, but kept running. “He knows if he looks at me I’ll drag him upstairs to the hotel room and put him to bed,” Jeff grinned.
Mercifully, the DJ finally stopped playing disco and put on a set of slow songs to finish out the dance. Dale’s wife Donna and Jeff’s wife Elaine limped back from the dance floor, worn out and carrying their high heels.
“It’s late,” Dale said to his wife. “Why don’t we round up that grandson. If he spends the night in our room, Jeff and Elaine can stay out and party a bit longer.”
It took three adults to separate the toddler from the rest of the pack, but finally Dale had him under one arm and the three of them headed out the ballroom door to the elevator, leaving Jeff, Elaine, Mark and a handful of other cousins to head to a nightclub for last call.
The tired little boy was snoring before the elevator got to their floor, and Donna was asleep soon after. But not Dale.
Dale had been reading Canola Watch. He knew the canola council recommended growing canola only one year in four. He knew pushing rotations was risky. But he also knew that Mark likely needed the extra cash. Mark and his brother had had a lot of poor crops over the past few years. And when Mark’s wife left, she’d hired a cagey lawyer to fight for a good settlement. Dale couldn’t imagine how they were making the combine payments.
But would Jeff follow suit? Dale had always tried to pass on his feeling of a long-term responsibility for the land. “We’re in this business for the long haul, and we have to act like it,” Dale had said, more than a few times.
Mark wasn’t alone in being short on cash. Hanson Acres hadn’t had a banner year last year. After spring flooding in the southeast, they seeded only 500 of their 5,000 acres, and that hadn’t yielded well. Crop Insurance payments would keep them afloat, but there wouldn’t be enough income to allow the Hansons to take much money out of the farm for a while. Dale’s family wasn’t short of money, but he knew Jeff’s wife had been talking about wanting a new house. Maybe she was putting Jeff under more pressure than Dale realized.
Dale thought he and Jeff had finalized their seeding plans. They’d booked seed, and cleaned their own seed. But Dale was trying to pass control of the farm on to his son. Was Jeff changing plans on his own now? Without telling his father?
Dale spent most of the night flopping around in bed, periodically getting up to look out the window at the parking lot. “Just keeping an eye on the car,” he told Donna when she woke to see him pacing at 3:30 a.m. “You know how high the crime rate is in Saskatoon.”
There were giant dark circles under Dale’s eyes when he, Donna, and their grandson took the elevator down to meet Jeff and Elaine for breakfast the next morning. They found Jeff and Elaine in the lobby, saying goodbye to Mark. “That sounds like good advice,” Jeff was saying to Mark. “I’ll text you.”
Mark said his goodbyes and the Hanson family went to the hotel restaurant. They greeted a few tables full of other Hanson relatives staying in the hotel as they followed the hostess to a booth.
After they read the menu, they talked about the toddler. About cousin Allison’s wedding dress. Uncle Tony’s dancing. Donna’s blistered heel. Until finally Dale couldn’t stand it anymore and he had to find out what Jeff was planning.
“So,” Dale said. “Canola?”
“What’s that?” Jeff said.
“You’re planning to seed a fair bit of canola?”
“What are you talking about?” Jeff asked, clearly baffled. “We went over the seeding plans a couple weeks ago. You booked the seed. Didn’t you?”
“But, last night. Mark said…”
“I saw him talking to you,” Elaine said. “Was he on about canola again?”
“Yeah,” Jeff told his wife. “His neighbours must be furious. He’ll be spreading clubroot all over the area.”
“Or blackleg. Or Roundup-resistant weeds,” Elaine said. “But he probably needs the money.”
“So you were just stringing Mark along?” Dale asked.
“No point doing anything else,” Jeff said. “I just ignore him when he gets going. It’s not like he’d listen to me. Don’t worry. I’m not actually taking his advice.”
“Oh,” said Dale, trying to save face. “That’s what I figured.”
Jeff grinned. “You know what they say. We’re in this for the long haul. We have to act like it.”
Then the waitress came to take their order. Dale asked for the special. With extra coffee, to keep him awake on the drive home. CG
