The seeds of inspiration never cease to amaze me. Those seeds are planted and grow in both our physical and spiritual landscapes. Although they may find expression in a wider world, it is our viewshed that sometimes yanks at and always tweaks our creativity, reminding us how creativity is a gift that we dare not waste.
The other morning, we woke to a world dipped in white. The hoar frost that sprouted from the vegetation was plush and long. The fog was just lifting, and the light it allowed on the frost-laden trees made every view achingly beautiful.
The old Minneapolis Moline tractor that long ago had lost its usefulness for anything but parts had become part of another world, a world with no flaws, only graceful shapes. The saga of how my dad and I brought that tractor from the Fairfield Bench pushed at my memory.
1. Main protagonist: An 87-year-old rancher, whose project list had led
him to buy not one, but three used Minneapolis Moline tractors.
2. Supporting cast: His daughter just returned to Montana from living
for 20 years in the country’s most urban areas.
3. Setting: A bumpy gravel road stretching for over 50 miles through a
wind-swept landscape with only the high-flying hawks riding the
airwaves to oversee and “help.”
4. Plot: The two characters move the three tractors (plus their pickup
truck) home to the ranch. That’s doable!
5. Conflict: Man vs. Nature (Four wheeled vehicles and only two
drivers, no nearby ranches, and a flat tire on one of the
tractors)
Man vs Self (“What were we really thinking?”)
Man vs Man (“Did you bring the water?” “No, I thought you
had!”)
6. Theme: Ingenuity and persistence pay off in the end.
But with the frost, there is more than the historic memory. The yellow against the white focuses the eye and the memory on that day nearly 20 years ago. The intervening additions to memory are for a moment blocked and the mind recalls the day in full – the people, the setting, the effort, and the result.
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.