Rumblefish arrived Friday evening while I was at the evening session of our church women’s conference. So I didn’t witness the truck’s majestic sweep up the driveway. With Allen driving, new daughter Abbey and dog packed in the cab and an antique piece of farm machinery in the back, it must have been a sight to behold.
My first encounter with our son’s pride and joy came when our overnight guest, the conference speaker drove home late Friday night. The monster in the truck bed waved its round metal fingers when we climbed out of our respective cars. With Halloween right around the corner, the leering piece of farm history was more than a little disconcerting.
The contraption was slightly less threatening in the cold light of day. Allen gave Hiram and me a quick tour of its finer points – a bunch of handles and levers that impressed my hubby to no end, but left me totally bored, bored, bored. Then, the two men went into the mechanical trance that overtakes Philo men in the presence of machinery. They launched into a discussion about gears and welding and other boring stuff.
I, on the other hand, went into my capture-the-moment mode. After all, the thing (It has something to do with grain and boring holes, and it is made to be drawn by horses, not a tractor. So if this were an essay question the explanation would be worth at least half-credit.) is the first tangible piece of our son and new daughter’s dream of owning an organic farm and working it with horses.
If that isn’t a moment to capture, what is?
Admittedly, the moment wasn’t all that pretty, with Hiram and Allen rolling their eyes at the sight of the camera. Rumblefish could use some sprucing up, it’s muffler needs voice lessons, and a dozen cans of spray paint would work wonders on the machiney thing. But there was a weary beauty to the spokes and springs, and a wondrous imagining of fields and crops and critters as our son shared this small beginning of an upcoming chapter of life.
So I concede that the acquisition of the the horse drawn whatever-it-is, which wintering in a farmer friend’s chicken coop, is a good first step into future – even though encountering it in the dark of night prickled the hair on my neck.
Still, I’m hoping the second step isn’t the horse.
