Unstuck

Almost anyone else would have to call a wrecker, but the Richards brothers are amazing when it comes to getting a vehicle unstuck. At one point the right rear wheel is hanging half way over into the culvert. Ronnie requests a come-a-long from B and they tighten a chain against lateral movement. They thought the whole operation took too long, they thought they get it out in thirty minutes, it took forty-five. We started at dawn. I was five minutes late for work. I thanked Ronnie (and B) profusely and they both looked at me like I was crazy. Ronnie said "Jeeze, Tom, we've only done it a thousand times." I never asked Liza what it cost her to get two different wreckers out here (the first one couldn't do the job) when she slid off the down-slope side. Ronnie and B would do it with a couple of come-a-longs. A couple of things at play here: if you live in the boonies you solve problems without a trip to town, and you have to like solving problems. Moving heavy things is always interesting. I'm losing my taste for it now, but I once moved an entire print shop, the building itself WITH all the cast iron equipment, almost a mile. I remember moving very slowly, with the tractor in first gear. There were a lot of small hydraulic jacks in play. I jacked the building up, on the trailer, drove through the new foundation I'd prepared, lowered the building onto the plates I'd prepared, bolted it home. Did I mention those non-fruiting Oriental pear trees? They are so beautiful right now, scarlets and purples on the outside, and still vivid green on the inside. They suck, as trees, because the branches are so weak, but they crown out nicely, and they can grow in a parking lot. I unfolded boxes for six hours today. Then repainted a gallery as a break, parked at the bottom of the hill and walked up, poking the ground with my mop-handle walking stick. I need to know what is soft and what is firm, it's not a real question, maybe it is, I don't know, I just poke. At the pub, I'd like to see the new bar maid without that eye make-up. Some local and some other greens, I make a great salad, that I toss with a wonderful vinaigrette, a raspberry, hazelnut thing, that really holds together. Matter, of course. A match made in heaven. Her name is Melissa, of course, and all I can hear is the Allman Brothers singing "Sweet Melissa". Maybe my favorite pop tune ever. I pull over to side of the road, to roll a smoke, at the lake, which I haven't seen in a while, and there are fifty of sixty geese, waddling. One of those moments. Don't outthink yourself. Sometimes geese waddling are just geese waddling. Not a metaphor for something else.
 
Tom
 
Another thing. Assume everyone is lying. Just as a position, a fall-back zone, consider what you might do then.