Rite of Spring

I know spring has begun when my colleague WannaskaWriter, who hereafter will be referred to as Steve, contacts me that he's stuck. I drop everything and run over to his place to help. I'm a bit of an expert at getting vehicles unstuck using little more than a jack, some chunks of wood, and an old tire or two.

I learned my skills while working for an impetuous German industrialist who had bought up thousands of acres around Badger and up in Kittson County. He bought the land as a hedge against a possible Soviet invasion. Herr G. would look out his window in Berlin and if it wasn't raining, he'd order all his tractors out into the field.

Of course we got stuck right away because Badger and Kittson County are soggy places compared to Berlin. I drove a big four-wheel-drive tractor with a huge implement behind. When stuck out in the boondocks, I was on my own. I had to get my handyman jack under the tongue of the implement to relieve pressure on the hitch pin so I could drive the tractor ahead. It was almost impossible to get an unencumbered tractor stuck. I drove ahead thirty feet and connected a steel cable to the implement and yanked it out of the soggy spot.

Things are a bit different with Steve, since it's often his tractor itself that's stuck. Steve has a fine Massey-Furguson 180 Diesel tractor, but it only has two-wheel-drive. Steve has often said he wished it had four-wheel-drive, but it doesn't. By the time I arrive, Steve has already assembled all the equipment needed to get out of his pickle. I'm not pretending I'm essential to rescue Steve. He will get it done one way or another. But Steve knows that I'm familiar with which of the saints solves which problem, so when I arrive he says, "Let us pray."

"Saint Frances of Rome, get us out of here."

I remember one situation when his 4WD truck was stuck. I counseled using his tractor to pull out his truck. He was leery of that knowing how soft the spring fields were and sure enough, the tractor was soon sunk right in front of the truck. Steve didn't call me for a couple of springs after that.

Well this year it was my turn. Last Saturday I drove over to Wayne's World to pump out the well. We call the forty acres across the road Wayne's World because our friend Wayne used to own it. Also in memory of the old SNL skit. Wayne had planned to move a trailer house in there and had a road built and a well dug. Then he bought another place with a house already on it. He asked us if we wanted to buy the piece. We burned wood at the time and this piece of land had lots of easily accessible popple (aspen).

A few years after we bought the land, the State sent us a letter saying all unused wells had to be either filled in or pumped at least once a year. It seems children were falling into unused wells. Our well only had a five inch diameter pipe sticking out of the ground, so not even a resourceful child could fall down it. Not wanting to fill in a good well, I bought a small cast iron hand pump and stuck on eight feet of plastic pipe.

Once a year I'd haul the pump over to the well and pump out a few gallons. I had to remember to bring a hammer to knock off the plastic cap and a jug of water to prime the pump. After a while I noticed the water was always at the top of the well pipe when I removed the cap. Also, a rust stain began to form on the outside of the white pipe. We had a flowing well.

So there was no need to pump it out, but every few years I'd drive over and pump out some water just for the heck of it, as I did on Saturday. The first half of the road is in the open, while the second half is in the woods. I really should have stopped halfway in and scouted ahead on foot. I usually turn around where the trailer would have been, but I could tell conditions were boggy. "I'll just back out," I thought.

After pumping the well, I hopped in the truck and started backing. I could see in the mirror there was a spot where my tires had cut through the leaf litter. It was here I met my waterloo. Once stopped, I resisted rocking the truck back and forth. It just gets you dug in deeper. I could have walked the half mile home and returned with planks and my (Steve's spare) handyman jack and gotten myself out in a couple of hours. But we had a ZOOM meeting with friends coming up, so I emailed Steve requesting a Sunday pull-out.

Steve emailed right back and said Sunday was his day for helping friends in need. He included a list of all the equipment he'd be bringing, forgetting only a mini-Thai elephant. My rescue was anticlimactic. Steve hitched his thirty foot chain between my rear bumper and his and quickly popped me out of my hole. But instead of stopping, he accelerated till we reached the open part of the road. I had an exciting time keeping my truck from slewing into the trees along the road. No harm done. And now it was time for Steve's celebratory Guinness.

Salvation Army Tank