Omikuji

In Japan, at Shinto shrines and many Buddhist temples, one will find Omikuji, which translates literally as "sacred lottery". Omikuji are small slips of paper with a fortune on it. People randomly pick their fortune by shaking a stick out of a box and getting the Omikuji that matches the number on their stick. If the fortune is very good the paper may be taken home. Most often, though, people tie the thin strips of paper with their fortune on it to the branch of a bush outside the shrine in hope that the spirits will make good on the good fortunes, or exorcise the bad ones. Outside of the shrines there are bushes whose branches are completely full of these white papers, like some garish spring bloom, festooned with everyones hopes and fears. 

I thought of this a few weeks ago after a day of strong gusty wind. This wind blew over trees, and made the power flicker on and off. It made fields blow, and used tumbleweeds to knock over my electric fences. These winds scoured the dried corn leaves out of the fields and hung them in the tree branches where they caught the dying light of sunset. Windblown Omikuji. 

So Long, Stella

Last Saturday Mare, Ella and I went to the shop to say goodbye to Steady Stella. And to write her name on her so the new owner would know what to call her. For those of you who haven't been to the ranch, Stella was our 1982 John Deere 7720 combine. We recently upgraded to a newer, larger machine, so we sold Stella to our combine mechanic.  We've owned her since 1984. She was the first combine I ever drove, and she has been Maret's combine during harvest for many years now. A few years ago, during a rather long and drawn out harvest, all the other combines were constantly breaking down. But our 7720, which was old and slow and outclassed, kept on running while the other machines were parked at the edge of the field getting fixed. That is how she earned the name of Steady Stella.

 

It is surprising how attached one can get to a combine. It is different from driving a car; the level of interaction is much more intimate. All the senses are involved. Every morning during harvest you walk around the machine and do any number of maintenance checks: greasing zerks, checking the oil, tugging on the belts, and wobbling the pulleys to test the bearings for slop.

Once in the field cutting the crop, one is constantly adjusting the speed, the header height, and the reel height, all while steering carefully to keep the header fully in the crop. Meanwhile one listens closely to the raucous din of the machine, trying to discern any new or unusual squeals, whines, rattles, or whoomph-whoomphs that could indicate a problem in the making. Occasionally, one will even smell a problem- maybe burnt rubber from a shredded belt.

All the hours spent, day after long harvest day, over the course of twenty some-odd years, driving and fixing the same combine breeds a familiarity that is hard to explain. The machine becomes an extension of you. An enormous, lumbering extension.  

Stella wasn't always the most enjoyable machine to drive, either. The cab was small, and with the engine right next to it, the noise was deafening. But unlike the new machines which are completely computerized and digital, with tiny color coded toggle switches everywhere, Stella was old school. She had multiple analog gauges, and big knobs to turn, and long levers to push and pull. She was from a different generation. Driving Stella made you feel a bit like the Wizard in the Wizard of Oz, behind the curtain, furiously at work adjusting the machine, cutting the wheat. You knew you were getting work done. 

You'll be missed, Stella.

Here are a few photos of Stella, some new and some old.

 

Tuesday Morning

Hoar's frost coated everything Tuesday morning. Between the ice coating, and the fog, there was little color. Trees glow white against the gray sky. When the fog burned off, the sky was jarring with its blueness, and the sun beat the frost off everything with a rattle and crash.

A Busy Time

Fall heading into winter is a busy time. We harvest the garden before a hard freeze. Joel planted the wheat with a rented tractor pulling an enormous air seeder on loan from a neighbor. Wean the calves, and take them to the sale barn. Preg check, vaccinate, and back pour the cows. Build miles and miles of electric fence. Harvest the corn with the new combine - a John Deere 9760STS with a 12 row head. Yep. It's all that. And, this is most important, be sure to feed Rocket, Roxie, and Chief some treats.