L E T T E R S

Senior Farmers
 
Senior farmers, please be careful.

With a front loader bearing un-reliable brakes, our friend loaded 36  big ol’ 3x4x8 bales onto our semi-tractor’s flat bed trailer...by himself.  

Although sprite for his 74 years of age, after working from the loaders bucket to throw the 50 feet rachet straps over the hay, and fighting with the loader, he did look a bit peaked.

I would of helped, but with my progressing clumsiness, knew I’d probably get cold-cocked with one of the rachets and become an immediate liability to the project at hand.

Charles, my very spry 70 year old husband, still balances nearly upside down on a 16 inch plank each time he takes a hay hook and adjusts the very deep ditch water swiftly flowing under.   And lately, each time he comes back from this venture, he looks a bit more peaked.

I would help, but - I can’t bear to watch. So he’ll have to continue...by himself.

So, mostly I just stay in the shop connecting battery charger to, oh, any tractor that has my grader blade on it. Sometimes, like yesterday, a  wasp seeking refuge on my body,  forces me to whip off my ball cap, peal back the gloves, strip down to my bra, and trip over at least one of the two dogs...both yelping at each other,  “RUN! FAST! THERE SHE BLOWS!"
I’m happy to do this...by myself.

Now just this morning, my 68 year old, extremely active Mississippi farmer brother called.  He was restless as the dickens, because...he was bed strapped.  Last Saturday, he was trying to unload twelve hundred pound round bales...by himself, when his errant tractor lunged forward, threw him off, and nailed him to the ground trapping him between the tractors gas tank and a bale. With broken ribs, lapped over ribs, crushed leg and God only knows what else (He ALWAYS plays down such.), he prayed A LOT while studying the tractors belly to see how he could extract himself from such a mess. 

Like detonating a bomb, he took a chance and touched some wire to a solenoid (I didn’t understand this part.), causing the tractor to lurch backwards. Its huge tire missed him by 2 inches and charged into another bale where its tires dug holes.
The point of all this?  Well senior farmers, I think you’ve probably gotten it by now.  Please be careful, and have someone help you. Unless you plan on stripping down to your bra.
 

Roni Bell Sylvester