Yesterday – 1966 – summer

I know I'm asking a great deal of all of you who read this blog with any kind of regularity but I get such ideas, thoughts and feelings triggered by some of the images but I'm coming across to as I put things on to the hard drive. Today's rendering for example is an image I am titling “Incorrigible”. I'm not sure when this image was taken but had to be shortly before my accident which changed my life forever. I had to be at least late 14 early 15 years of age in this image. It's really one of the only images which show me with a fairly decent stature. Of course it's the summer you can tell because my hair is relatively long compared to how long my hair is during the winter months of the year when I'm wrestling. I was cut my hair short – – one of my tactics for winning. I look fairly tanned in this image. This means it's probably early July just weeks before my accident. The shirt that I'm wearing I barely remember hacking off the sleeves and thinking that I look sort of cool in this garment. Thank goodness I've not found “wife beater” T-shirts at this point. Then I would looked like something that wandered in from Garden City. I cannot imagine who took this image, makes me think that we had company or something and the camera was out to take images of the visitors and somehow someone snapped one of me. I like the image however and wish I had more images from this point in time.

Since this picture was taken in the summer we probably have gone through the first cutting of hay. This means I would've been out with the pitchfork in the hay wagon throwing loose hay on the wagon and then throwing that hay from the wagon onto the stack. What a great workout. The days are hot and sweaty and often I would be caked green with hay dust. We often would take a couple hours during the hottest time of the day usually over lunch and either walk across Johnson's fields to the twin Bridges or pump the 10 speeds. The trick was to dive in water swim and then around 2 PM or 3 PM bike back to the house and drive the hay wagon back to the field and load hay so that when dad got home he would see is working in the fields. As an adult now I can see how stupid my actions were. He knew we were working over that period of time or the whole job would've been done. I think he just shrugged was glad to see that something had gotten done. I really was not a very good farm child. I'm sure I deserve whatever I've gotten in my life wreck included.

The picture documents my preaccident life. I was tough, sort of, I looked okay all things considered I wish I could just Stephen King myself back some days and release some of those moments…