Windy Week
I’m pretty sure the wind wants me to be a hoarder.
My garbage has been piling up for a while.
The grizzlies are already awake in the mountains so I need to take my trash to the dump before they come visiting.
But every time I open a horse trailer door to load garbage cans, net wrap, and various assorted trash, the wind tries to blow the door off.
Still, last week I hooked the trailer up and stubbornly began to fill it.
At least I could get part of it loaded before it was time to sort lambs to take to the processor.
My daughter, Abby, brought a friend to help us sort lambs from the flock because that’s how we have fun around here.
Dusk was settling on the prairie as we headed toward the barn, 70 mile per hour winds stretching our steps.
We looked up to see part of the barn’s west wall was missing.
It had caved into the relative safety of the barn, taking the fence with it.
Abby and her friend moved boards out of the way while I walked back to unhook the pickup from the dump trailer and gather pallets to build a quick temporary fence for the night.
Everyone should have extra pallets laying around for just such emergencies.
I loaded a few pallets, drove to the barn and had a flat tire.
I must have picked up a nail.
The tire would have to wait. Dark was falling and we had a lot to accomplish.
We built a quick fence, sorted lambs and exhausted ourselves as we trudged back to the house in the wind.
I wondered if Abby’s friend would ever come back.
Two days later, the wind was still howling with a vengeance.
The barn roof looked like the wind could raise it right off the trusses, but it held tight.
The people who situated the barn just right in the bottom of the coulee must have considered prevailing winds before they built this barn more than 100 years ago.
I breathed a sigh of relief.
Until I noticed a power pole next to my 96-year-old Grandma’s House leaning at a 45-degree angle.
Nobody lives in Grandma’s House at the moment, but my new apprentice will move in within a month.
The pole wouldn’t land on the house, but if it fell, a fire might burn all the way to Minnesota.
The electric company technician was there within an hour to disconnect the electricity and lower the pole safely.
It turns out that I, not the power company, own that pole.
I get to replace it.
My mind went into overdrive.
Typically, my mind does not question what to do, but how to do it.
Typically, this question arises at 1:34 am.
By 2:30 am, I remembered the salvaged power poles laying in a pile.
One of them ought to be good enough to hold a meter and wires in the air.
I just needed a hole.
I have a skid steer and an auger.
Both give me great joy.
Once I have a deep hole, I can switch the skid steer to the forks, chain the pole to the skid steer, raise it up and slide it into the post hole.
Then I’ll call the power company to hook up the wires.
After all, I’m not a very good electrician yet.
What could go wrong?
I’ll tackle the barn wall later.
All I need to do is figure out how.
No doubt, my mind will come up with a solution soon.
Check in with me at 3:56 am.
Meanwhile, the wind finally quit long enough to load my hoard. The bears will have to find food elsewhere.