Luck

It's funny how often old stories still work.

There's a long-abandoned farm site a mile or so from our house. My guess is I'm the only person alive who knows that's where my father was born. Anyway, I noticed some work going on around it - tree cutting, a little digging, etc.

The only structure remaining was an old windmill. Pretty much worthless, peppered with bullet holes the way old wind turbines are in this part of the world. But I have the top off an old windmill working as a grape arbor and I figured there would be some project I could do with another one. I checked with the owner, and he didn't have the sentimental attachment to it that I have, so I added “windmill removal” to my to-do list.

In a splendid coincidence, Number Three was looking for summer employment.

I picked him up Wednesday afternoon and we loaded up the skidsteer, chainsaw and about a hundred pounds of tools and headed over to the windmill. There was a full-grown tree towering up through the middle of it that needed to be carefully sawn into pieces. Carefully, because wood is heavy and I've noticed over the years that chainsaw chains react badly to contact with angle iron. Also, my wife and I have an agreement about ladders, chainsaws, and me. Things went more or less according to plan, and we wrapped up the project about suppertime. After we ate, I lounged around for about half an hour, but I'd been watching weather reports, and was feeling a certain sense of urgency. I put my shoes on and went back to work. I unhitched the grapple from the skidsteer and hooked onto a mower. The next morning, I woke Number Three up a couple of hours earlier than any rational teenager would want to rise. I swung open the orchard gate and he mowed the out-of-control grass and brush while I lopped off volunteer trees. We finished that project and I handed him off to his grandmother to clean up a small garden next to the house while I put equipment away. We both finished our jobs in a light rain. The rain got heavier and continued for the rest of the day and then the next day we got seven inches of rain. Any outside work that doesn't involve ditches or pumps is on hold for a while.

A long time ago, I read some advice from a business consultant who felt that the most important thing for running a business is a sense of urgency. If you have that, many other things fall into place. I think about that idea often, and it inspired me to tell Number Three this story. My wife was in the room, too, but she's heard this story fifty or sixty times, so there's a chance she tuned me out a little.

One spring we had a brutal planting season – bad weather so we just couldn't get anything done. Finally there was a break in the weather, and everyone hit the ground running. I was watching the weather forecasts and there was a big front that started at the Rocky Mountains and moved toward me about a hundred miles a day. I worked harder and the last night I planted for 24 hours straight, finishing up about 6:00 a.m. It started to sprinkle about 7:00 and rained for the rest of the week. A few days later I saw a neighbor in town who hadn't gotten his crop planted and he said, “You must be the luckiest guy in the world.” I smiled and agreed, but inside I was thinking, “It's not all luck.”

Granted, tearing down an old windmill and cleaning up an overgrown orchard isn't particularly important, but I love crossing things off my list. And I enjoy the feeling you get when you push...just a little.

There's a lot out of our control in this complicated world, and sometimes what happens is due to luck, both good and bad.

But it's not all luck. I hope Number Three thinks about that.

Copyright 2025 Brent Olson