The Wave

  A woman told me recently that her husband waves at every vehicle he passes. She says it's his way of offering loving kindness. If he did this in New York or Chicago, he'd soon be chased down and dragged from his car. Some people can't stand love.
  But up here where you can go for miles without seeing another vehicle, you can wave away without incident. It's like saying hi to people you meet out on the trail. In the woods you're assuring yourself the other person is not a murderous hermit. It gives you a second to check for that homicidal gleam so you can take evasive action. People don't realize they carry walking sticks not for balance but for self defense.
  On days I feel exuberant, about one in every seven, I too wave at everyone. But it's rare anyone waves back. I've caught them by surprise. They're daydreaming, or texting, or worse. If someone waves at me, such as the above gentleman, I never, ever have time to return his salutation. Once he passes (and it's always a he) I wave my whole arm in my rear view mirror. My wife screams as we head for the ditch. "Who was that?" she says as I return to my own lane. "Don't know," I reply.
  There are psychoanalysis sites on the Internet. I might run down some algorithms to figure out why my failure to respond to a random stranger's wave causes me guilt and shame.
  It's free and anonymous.

A Singular Wave

Senior Worker

  After twenty-two months of retirement, I am back in the workforce. I always figured I'd pick up a part time job if something appealing turned up. A few weeks ago Teresa went to the little transit company in town to get tickets for her dad. They asked her if she wanted to drive bus. No she said, but I might.
  I've had many jobs over my career and most of them had a driving component. Driving is the ultimate freedom for me, no matter where I'm going. The bus company was looking for a back up driver. I was looking for a job that wouldn't tie me down. I was surprised what a rigmarole it was to get into the system. Fortunately my commercial driver's license was still valid from my days on the farm. But I had to get a DOT physical. The man doctor at the clinic was said to be slap-dash while the lady doc was thorough. I booked the man. Call me chauvinistic.
  I also had to provide my driving record for the past five years, $9.00, as well as a drug free urine sample. Oh, I had to pay for the physical myself, $85.  No wonder they have trouble getting drivers.
  I only want to work one day a week at most, but during my training period I was working four days a week. The Roseau Transit Authority has four buses. There are six a.m. runs out to Greenbush and Warroad. The early passengers are disabled people going to their assisted workplaces. During the day there are two buses on call to pick up people and take them around town, to the grocery, to the department store, to the pharmacy, the bank, the hair dresser. These folks rank from the so called dregs up to the well off. What they have in common is a lack of personal transportation. Ridership goes up when the weather is nasty, which is fifty per cent of the year. And the weather is the main topic of conversation with my passengers, though one conversation began "When I was in jail...." A bus driver hears and sees all kinds of things.
  During my training, the regular drivers told me it could get slow during the day and I should bring a book. Well I think I'm going to like getting paid for reading a book. It will be compensation for not getting paid for my book reviews.
  This past week I started driving routes on my own. I have to pick up people in various places around Greenbush, Badger, and Roseau. At first it seemed daunting, but the supervisor is kindly and provides lists and maps of who is where. My fellow drivers are right, it soon becomes routine.
  Next week I'm scheduled for a half day on Wednesday and all day Friday. I feel like I'm providing a moral good for my fellow man, my synapses are getting a tune up. and I have a little extra cash for  trips to the spa.

The Bus Sees All

The Mud Below

  I know spring is here when my friend Steve tells me his truck is stuck. Steve has a 1986 Toyota four wheel drive pickup which he likes to drive around the roads he has cut on his tree farm. In the spring, when the frost goes out, the truck's knobby tires break through the surface and sink into the bottomless mud. It's too late to back out. That just throws more clumps of mud onto the watching trees.
  Last year he used his tractor to pull the truck out and got the tractor stuck too. So this year Steve was determined to get the truck out with his own brains and brawn. He called me in as a consultant. I used to work on the farm of a wild German. This fellow would look out his window and if it was sunny in Berlin he would order us workers to "Run, run!" and we would drive out into the field and promptly get  stuck. We all got very good at extricating our equipment without calling for help, because help was miles away and cell phones had not yet been invented.
  When I arrived on the scene at Steve's, his truck had been sitting for a week. I could see he had cut a bunch of brush and stuck it under the wheels. He said this was how our ancestors got mastodons out of tar pits. We had carried some 2x4s out to the site, a nine minute walk from the house.  Steve used his Handyman jack to raise the rear tires enough to slip the 2x4s under the wheels. As Steve warmed up the engine I said a prayer of release. The tires spun on the planks and clouds of wood smoke billowed out. I love that smell. The 2x4s squirted to the side and chunks of mud began to fly.
  Steve had some concrete blocks in the back of his truck and got the idea to slip a block under the tire. This involved jacking the truck up again and shoveling away enough mud to slip the block into place. Then I jacked the truck up a few more clicks to get the 2x4 between the block and the tire to create a smooth highway for the truck. The chunk of plywood under the jack groaned and creaked and sank further into the mud but we got our plan in place. Steve fired up the truck. I said my prayer and he almost got out. Well let's jack up the other side and repeat. About this time Steve's wife Jackie arrived with refreshments and we took a break. At length we got the other side jacked, blocked and planked. Now it was no problem. Back he went, but he had to keep moving till he reached high ground and the mud flew for fifty feet. Momentum had shifted away from the mud and in favor of Steve. Next year we'll get the job done in half the time because we have a proven method.

Annual ritual

Please release this truck

Pretty doesn't get you out

Let us celebrate!

Email to My Editor

Teresa and I are in Tennessee visiting her sister and her husband. Faith and Aaron moved here 20 years ago to be close to their kids. 

Steve

  I'm going to make a fool of myself here with my snap judgments of the South but you're used to me doing that. 

We are in the middle South, in the little town of Gibson which is just a few miles from the much bigger town of Humboldt, and the much bigger city of Jackson.
Spring is in the air, the birds are chirping, the blossoms hang white or purple... it's nice. We had freeway or four lane highway all the way to within 20 miles of Faith's. This last stretch was quite narrow, a step back into the old South. Traffic was light as we buzzed past viarious architectural styles: classic high pitched cabins, small brick ramblers, kudzu covered trailers...the Skime of the South. The road was up and down and curvy, little chance to pass. Wetlands, pastures, small tillages. Not the megaculture like up in Missouri. 

 After lunch Teresa asked Faith if there were places to walk nearby. "Only if y'all hope to be cut down in the prime of your life," Faith said. "The road is narrow and the ditch is deep. Now why don't you just relax here and have a nice gin and tonic." Teresa opted for a glass of warm wine, but once her wine was gone she still wanted a walk. Faith said "OK, chile, how about I give you a tour of the area and then we'll stop by the liquor store for some Guinness."  Faith is making corned beef and cabbage and we're having a late St Paddy's Day celebration. What a great sister in law!
 So we take this tour of the area. I'm driving. Just one g. and t. under my belt. "Now what you have to understand about the South," Faith says, "is you'll see a mansion next to a trailer house. It's part of southern gentility. You don't want to put yourself above your neighbor. I thought it would hurt property values, but people here told me, 'No, we don't mind having a mansion next to our trailer house.'" 

Faith pointed out a collection of yellow brick ramblers built in the sixties. The houses were shaded by mature trees on hilly plots. Some were well kept, others obviously abandoned. "Gibson Country is depressed," Faith said.  She pointed to one, a burnt-out shell. "That was because of a boy who lacked parental guidance."  I thought I saw movement inside, but it was just the wind.

Sent from the Road

Care Befull

  If you're not careful you will fall eventually. The Romans knew that. The Latin verb for an unforeseen happening is accidere. And they went on to have the biggest fall of all time. The websites for the ageing say that you're going to slip in the shower or doze off while driving, etc., etc. These things will happen but you can work around them. Munch on candy as you drive. Wear your boots in the shower. But you can't remove all risk if you intend to have fun. Go to Europe! Go to Laos, or Machu Picchu! Just be back in your hotel pub before the youth gangs begin to prowl.

The Accident

 Listening to people's ailments makes me ill, in sympathy, so I'll keep this short. Last Sunday we were out walking on the perfectly smooth river ice. During the thaw two weeks ago, the river came up and the ice went out. Then the temps dropped to zero and the surface froze. Beautiful! But as the water ran out, the ice began to collapse to it's normal depth of one foot. To get onto the river you had to climb or slide down a sharply angled ice floe. This is where members of the party started to fall; nothing worse than a whacked funny bone for we were padded against the cold. When we reached the bridge we began turning over the floes by the shore, marveling at the patterns formed by the river on their undersides.

  At last it was time for hot chocolate by the warm stove. When I stepped onto the ice in the ditch, the goddess of gravity grabbed my ankles and thumped me on my back like a freshly caught halibut. My companions gathered round and helped me to my feet. I hadn't hit my head and my limbs still worked, but my inner works were all ajangle. My lungs felt too flat to take in air. My voice was thin and wheezy. My spine felt fine but the affiliated ribs were not happy.

  Once back home, I popped a couple of pills and sat quietly and thought of people in car crashes and running backs blindsided. I thought too of soldiers and hand grenades until I convinced myself things could be worse. I had promised to grill that evening, and a glass of wine settled the shaking in my hands. Matt fired up the coals and supper was served on time.

  By coincidence, I had a physical scheduled for later in the week. The doctor said I'd be fine. He told me he was in the middle of inventing boots with studs that would retract into the soles when you went inside so you didn't tear up the floor. I told him to put me on his list.

Beneath the floes. Beautiful, cold; indifferent to you.

The Open Road

  Toad of Toad Hall loved the open road. He described it thus: "Here today, up and off to somewhere else tomorrow! Travel, change, interest, excitement! The whole world before you, and a horizon that's always changing! But Toad wanted to travel in a gigantic horse drawn gypsy cart. I prefer to travel with a toothbrush and a change of underwear, relying on public transit and the kindness of strangers. The idea of life in an RV gives me the fantods. A ride in a semi-trailer truck from point A to B with no strings attached would be a different matter. My mother told me my first sentence was "Big, big truck," and I've been fascinated with the big rigs ever since, with no desire to get behind the wheel. I've watched the trucks pass a half mile to the east of our place for over forty years. I can tell which are loaded by the vibrations passing from the cracked highway, through the open field, and into my couch.
  Last winter I convinced my editor to join me in a truck count in Roseau. For several hours we sat just south of town counting the trucks that came and went, following the occasional one to see where in town it went. If you know my editor, Mr. Steve Reynolds, you know this was more interesting than it sounds. But it was a bust because Polaris, the town's largest employer, was closed just then for its winter lay-off, so truck traffic was way off. Nevertheless, I published my findings in The Raven.
  Soon after, my friend Bob Aronson called. Bob drives for Byfuglien Trucking. He had seen my story and wondered if I'd like to ride along on his daily run. Bob picks up parts for Polaris in Bagley 100 miles to the south, and is back home by mid-afternoon. "Of course!" I replied. As life whirls towards its end. it's good to be checking things off your bucket list. I imagine this list as slips of paper in an actual bucket. Mine is full to overflowing.
  Bob picked me up in Wannaska on a cool and sunny March morning not long ago. I was wearing my work boots rather than my usual sneakers. I had my mug of coffee and a couple of muffins. You never know what can happen when you leave home. Do you know why they call the big trucks semis? I looked this up. It's because the trailer has wheels only at the rear. If it had wheels at the front end too, it would be a trailer, but it doesn't, so it's a semi-trailer, pulled by a tractor. But not a farm tractor, though it will have the same engine used in farm tractors. Whew! I'll call the tractor the truck from now on.
  Bob's International truck looked brand new to me, but he said it was a 2011 model with over 700,000 miles on it. He keeps the truck at his home just east of Roseau. Every morning, Monday through Friday, he runs over to Polaris and picks up his empty trailer then heads for Team Industries in Bagley to pick up transmissions and differentials for Polaris's ATV products. "People ask if I don't get bored driving the same route," Bob says, "but I don't. I see something different every day." Driving semi is Bob's retirement job. After 33 years in Polaris's engineering department, Bob felt the need to keep doing something useful. Byfuglien Trucking had him shuttle trucks around Roseau for awhile before putting him on a day route, first to Detroit Lakes and now to Bagley.
  I had always wondered how smooth the ride would be, after all you're sitting directly above the engine. My seat was comfortable and the cab seemed well insulated, but I did feel every bump. Bob knew all the bad bumps and slowed before we reached them. I was also aware of the powerful engine beneath my feet and was glad I had my hearing aids cranked up to catch Bob's conversation. He had grown up in my neighborhood and I learned much interesting area history. Twenty years ago we bought a piece of land that Bob's father had once owned. There was a rusty old truck body on the land and Bob told me who put it there. Bob also told me of two old bachelors who had lived one after the other in flimsy shacks on this piece of land. I did not know that. There is no trace whatsoever of those shacks.
  It's a cliché that you see more from the cab of a truck. I have driven this road to Bagley many dozens of times, but today I could see the hills beyond the hills. What a pleasant way to see the world. We arrived at the loading dock before eleven. Bob opened the trailer doors and pulled a lock pin that held the gang of rear axles in place. From the cab, he was able to move the rear axles to the very back of the trailer. This made the trailer more stable for the fork lift loading the heavy pallets of transmissions onto the trailer. Twenty minutes later, Bob pulled away from the dock, closed the doors and moved the axles forward. The further forward the axles, the tighter the turning radius for the whole rig. I never thought of that before.
  We drove over to the new Cenex truck stop and had lunch. Warm sunshine poured through the big south windows. On Thursdays Bob picks up print jobs for Polaris at Richards Printing in Gonvick. Today was a Thursday so Bob asked the foreman to give us a tour of the shop. They had printing machines costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, but I was intrigued by the obsolete machines here and there that they keep running for the odd customer who still wants things done the old way. That is so sympatico.
  Bob had me back to my car by 2:15. Yes, I do love the open road. I'm willing to sleep in a hostel or even a frightening bus station if necessary, but there's nothing like my own couch when the approaching nap alert begins its gentle dinging.

Rush hour on the Gully Road

 

BIGFOOT IN FLOM

  They say all the trouble in the world is caused by man's inability to sit quietly in his room. That's true, but even the greatest mystic has to stand up and stretch now and then. On Saturday Teresa went to the annual Fiber Fest in Bemidji with her good friend Sue. I hadn't been on a jaunt with Steve for awhile, so I called him from my room.  He was sitting quietly in his room staying out of trouble but said he was up for a ride in the country.  I asked him to pick the destination. He thought it over and named Flom. He said he would call his friend Lyle and get us an invitation for lunch. Now Flom truly is in the middle, not of nowhere, but of little traveled country. The citizens of Flom love the place but there are not enough of them to make an impact on the world. At least when I try to tell people where we live I can say we're right below that little smokestack on the top of America. If they don't get it, I draw a  map in the dust and that always jogs their memory.  But Flom is hard to visualize, located 36 miles northeast of Fargo and just west of the White Earth Reservation. Most little towns hug the highway but Flom is set back a mile from the east-west Highway 113.
  Flom is 127 miles mostly south and some west of Palmville so we would not be able to explore much if we were going to make our noonish arrival. The big atlas said we'd have to do some backtracking to reach Flom but the more finely grained gazeteer showed the gravel roads we could zig and zag on to save miles. This part of the state is mostly low hills with winding streams cutting deeply through the hills. We would drop into these heavily wooded ravines noting the old farm buildings sinking back into the earth. It takes many fewer farmers to work the land now than it did even fifty years ago. The gazeteer does not conform exactly to reality and we tend to get a little lost when taking a short cut.
  Lyle's wife Margit was stirring a pot of what I assumed was soup when we arrived. Lyle is a jolly fellow and a good story teller and gave us coffee as Margit continued stirring. The soup turned out to be rømmegrøt, a Norwegian milk and flour pudding. You pour sugar and cinnamon and butter on it and eat it before your meal. It's delicious and after a couple of bowls you don't  really need a lunch, but I ate a couple of sandwiches to be polite. Lyle and Margit believe that if you put pictures in an album, you'll never look at them, so they've dedicated themselves to covering every inch of their walls with things to look at. They were stymied at first by the sloping walls upstairs, but the discovery of a stickum product allowed them to empty a couple of more albums. After a tour of their house you realize that even the most empty seeming country has a deep history.
  We left Flom around two p.m. knowing we'd have time to wander the countryside. You always see interesting things even in tourist-free zones. Just a few miles down the road from Flom we spotted an unmistakable silhouette. Yes, yes, it was Bigfoot!  What was Bigfoot doing here in farm country? He usually lurks among the lakes and forests to the east. Maybe he just felt the need to get out and about, like Steve and me. He froze as we approached. He didn't dare cross the road, and now people were coming out of the house behind him. I was able to get a great pic with my phone but felt bad invading his privacy. As we drove away, the people in the house were taking pot shots at him, but it would take a lot more than a gun to kill Bigfoot.