After Gifts, Mystery

Gifts sometimes are accompanied by mystery--who really left the excellent sausage on our kitchen counter top? That mystery eventually solved itself--our neighbor Joe Wilkes had dropped it by.

But some mysteries remain--well, mysterious.

Last Sunday, Martha called from our driveway, blocked by a large construction truck. Trotting down there in the sloppy snow, we found, indeed, a truck from a Pegram company, not so carefully backed into our driveway and leaning against the fence. There were three post-hole diggers, a wet box of wrenches and bolts, a coil of wavy silver wire, an almost-new generator, an armload of crowbars, a drill, the drill charger, and a rumpled fluorescent vest.

What there was not was a driver, either in or around the truck or up or down the road, or a note. Interestingly, there were also no coffee cups, beer cans, or the usual detritus found inside a work truck--gloves, notebooks, lunch bags.

The police informed us that since the vehicle had been abandoned on our property, this was entirely our problem. Several of our neighbors generously offered to adopt the stray, and Kabir, arms crossed as he rocked back on his work boots, said this was a fifty-thousand dollar truck.

Over the next few days Tom played phone tag with the company whose logo was painted on the truck, and eventually someone came and drove it, presumably, home. It had not been missed, no one knows who drove it out here or where he went, and whoever retrieved it didn't stop to talk to Tom or to pick up the box of wrenches.

The Bermuda Triangle has its mysteries. So does Scottsboro. Though ours are ranged more in a skinny rectangle up and down both sides of Old Hickory Boulevard.

Gifts.

Tom is justly famed for his potluck blessings. This last Tuesday he, by way of gratitude, informed the Lord that he was very very pleased with our new-to-us 20-foot neckover deckover 5-foot dovetail braked trailer.

A week ago I came home to find an excellent roll of homemade sausage on the countertop--Joe Wilkes had dropped it by.

JodyTheComputerGeekSpelunkerJuggler helped me figure out how to record a poem for The Cortland Review.

The greenhouse has a lovely midline green haze of thready little onion starts. The garden keeps giving us carrots, and EricTheFarmer dropped by some little cabbage sprouts.

Elaine brought over lunch today.

But the farm's biggest gifts lately are the Sandhus--father and son, they have poured concrete, dug holes, designed water systems, trucked hay. To say nothing of loaning us their grandmother and her excellent cooking and philosopher/farmer grandfather.

We give thanks every day, and the Sandhus are welcome to use our new-to-us 20-foot neckover deckover 5-foot dovetail braked trailer whenever they need to move something really really big. And Kabir can raid our refrigerator any time.

Thank you, whoever you are. We will all do our best to keep on giving.