Growing up, Fourth of July wasn't really a holiday for my family. Wheat harvest was one of our major sources of income (also corn and cattle, among a few other things). When late June/early July rolled in, other people were having BBQ's at the lake, and we were packing up lunches and dinners for our dad and the hired help, taking it out to the field.

When we were younger, we'd go for rides on the combine with dad or grandpa, and maybe take a truck ride full of grain to be weighed at the CO-OP with our uncle. I'd watch my baby brother try and 'be big' like the 'big guys' and step over the wheat stubble in his little boots. His hat seed hat on, chewing the grain to make 'wheat gum', pretending his liked it because the 'big guys' did. Sometimes on the Fourth, if we stayed out late enough, we could see the fireworks off in the distance.

As the size of our farming operation grew, so did our need to have custom cutters. We maintained a relationship with one family out of Kansas for more than thirty years. They'd come into town with beautiful pieces of equipment, and big black trucks, pickups, and grain carts. They'd stagger themselves in line in the field, go around in pattern of the field. Truly, it was a beautiful sight. I have many memory sitting on the back of a pickup truck, eating my dinner, watching them go against the sunset. (We are still in touch with this family; they are like family to us)




You know, you think those times will go on forever. You think that eventually, you'll be taking your little boy to the field and helping him climb up to a combine into the waiting arms of your dad. You think he'll get a chance to sit behind the steering wheel of a combine and watch the wheat fold and buckle underneath, and tossed into the back. You just don't think those times will ever stop. And sometimes, I just wanna say, "Damn the world for stopping and making me get off that ride; it was too much fun". If anything, it makes me really savor the moments now. They are too fleeting when you get right down to it all.

This is a picture of me in the wheat field with my dad. And it is my all-time favorite photo of me with my dad, and I know I've posted it before. I love seeing the storm rolling in, seeing him look and dressed just the way I remember him. I can close my eyes and be right in this moment and that makes me so happy.



"I am a miser of my memories of you
And will not spend them."
~Witter Bynner, "Coins"

Labels: daddy, fourth of july, love thursday a day early, wheat harvest