The first day, Dale found ways to cope with the frustration. He watched from his truck, driving out to the field and back. He paced the yard, if hopping around the yard on crutches could be called pacing. He phoned his son, texted his father. But by 10 a.m. on Day 2, Dale hit the wall.
“I’m going to run the tractor,” he announced to his wife when she brought their grandchildren outside to see what he was up to.
“They can get by without you,” Donna said. “Jeff’s running the tractor. Elaine and your dad are doing fine keeping the cart loaded. And Jeff says Alan’s doing fine picking rocks.”
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“Alan’s only been working here for 15 minutes. We can’t put all our eggs in his basket.”
“You’re still taking painkillers,” Donna said, giving him a hard glare. “It’s right on the label: ‘No heavy machinery.’”
“I haven’t taken any pills all day,” he said triumphantly.
“That explains all that moaning I heard when you thought I wasn’t in the room,” Donna said.
Dale had been in a lot of pain since he’d broken his ankle falling off the top platform of the grain cart, changing the tank lid seals two weeks earlier. But the physical pain was nowhere near as bad as the pain of not being part of spring seeding.
Before noon Dale had convinced the rest of the crew that he was perfectly able to run the tractor. His son Jeff had given in reluctantly, mainly because they also had a customer coming to the farm to pick up seed, someone had to go to town for more fertilizer and Alan had already hit a fence with the rock picker.
Dale had a tough time making his way up into the cab, carrying his cooler full of lunch in one hand and clutching his crutches under an arm. But he managed to use his free hand and one good leg to pull himself up the ladder.
Dale was happy to be back in the cab. It was a huge relief for him to finally do something useful, and this was his favourite field to seed. It was just north of the Hanson farm, and this time of day every time Dale came up over the hill he could see the sun glinting off the bins at the edge of the yard. It was also the field closest to the road — the field that all the neighbours would be sure to associate with the Hansons, and the field with the potential to make him the most proud of the operation.
This was going to be the year, all right, Dale thought. The soil was moist, but not too wet. They’d done soil tests and with what they were adding, there should be nitrogen to spare. His ankle barely hurt at all. That new song he liked came on the radio, so Dale turned it up.
The throbbing in his ankle picked up as the afternoon went on. By 5, it was getting hard for him to think about anything else, but he was almost finished with this quarter. He stopped at the corner of the field closest to the house, next to the road, where Ed and Alan were waiting with the trucks.
Dale couldn’t get out of the cab to help out. He hoped nobody would drive by and see him, just sitting there like a lump while everybody else did the work. Or, if anybody did drive by, Dale sure as heck hoped it would be somebody who knew about his ankle, so they wouldn’t think he’d got lazy. Or worse yet, old.
Ed and Alan finished up. They shut off the augers and waved him off. Dale pulled out, being extra careful to edge around the power pole — close, but not too close.
Then his stomach tightened as the wheels started to spin. It was much wetter in that low spot by the pole than Dale had expected. He didn’t breathe again until the wheels caught and he was back in motion, just in time to notice Ralph, crawling by on the road with the grader, waving. If Ralph saw him do anything stupid, it would be all over the RM before morning. Dale waved back, hoping Ralph hadn’t noticed that he’d almost gotten stuck, or that he’d been just sitting around while the guys filled the cart.
And suddenly the alarm was going off and his phone was ringing and the radio was way too loud. He swung around in his seat to see what was going on and banged his left leg on the steering column. “Damn ankle!” he cursed. “Damn phone!” And then he cursed again. He’d left the fan off.
He switched it on. How far had he gone? Thirty? Forty feet? Thirty feet with no seed in the drill? A long empty stretch right by the road. But it wouldn’t be empty would it? There’d be a patch of weeds twice as big as the damn garden.
Could he turn around and take another run at this spot? Not without Ed and Alan seeing him. And Ralph too, of course. And now there was a pickup truck going by. And another one coming from the south. Jim Callum, slowing down to take a good look. They would all know exactly what he’d done if he turned around. And next time through, he’d probably get stuck to boot.
“Damn drill,” Dale shouted, and kept on going. “Why do they make them so damn wide?”
This was the worst possible place for a weedy mess. It couldn’t be closer to the house. The road. Dale was mortified. Horrified. Embarrassed. Could he even get his pounding ankle out of the cab if this stress made him throw up? How would he tell Jeff?
Dale held himself together for 20 more minutes, when Jeff drove out. Dale stopped the tractor and Jeff climbed up.
“I ate early, Dad,” Jeff said. “You’ve put in a long enough day. Go in. Mom’s got supper for you. And take something for that ankle — looks like you’re in pain.
“Yeah,” Dale said. “Listen, Jeff…”
“I know we said we could do it without you,” Jeff told Dale, “but I’m not really sure how. It’s great of you to come out here, with that leg.”
“About that…,” Dale started, but Jeff interrupted again.
“Dad, I just want you to know. I don’t how I could keep this farm going if something happened to you.”
“But there’s a…,” Dale tried.
“You’ve taught me a lot about this. I don’t say thank you enough.”
Dale didn’t have the heart to try again. Maybe by the time the crop came up, everybody would forget who’d seeded this field.
Jeff’s phone rang while Dale was still struggling to drag his cast through the door of the cab.
“Yeah, sure,” Jeff was saying. “We’ll put those variety signs up right in the field Dad just seeded. It’ll be perfect. Right by my house. Field’s in good shape. Ship ’em out as soon as you can.”
Dale put his crutches under his arms and headed home.
