I’m not really one whom you’d call a first adopter, especially when it comes to the newest, latest, greatest, fanciest piece of technological equipment. There are several reasons for my reticence to dive headfirst into the techno pool. For instance, I’m notoriously cheap and chronically broke, a combination that does not lend itself to early adoption of new and shiny gadgets. As if that were not enough, I’m not very brave when it comes to sailing out in unchartered waters. I’m just barely getting comfortable with the ninth generation of a phone that is now on its 26th iteration for most of the rest of the world.
I know it probably doesn’t really seem like much, but a couple of years ago, we were gifted one of the handiest contraptions we’ve ever had on the place. It’s a little battery-powered DeWalt air compressor. I’m not doing a commercial. There may well be other versions from a dozen other companies, but mine happens to be a bright yellow DeWalt, and since it’s my story, that’s what we’ll stick with.
I pack the compressor around in the cab of my old ‘93 Chevy flatbed pickup, which has somehow survived into its fourth decade serving as my primary cow-feeding vehicle, where it will be readily available in the most likely spots and occasions where I may need it. And you may or may not be surprised to find out that it gets a lot of regular use. It’s ideal for things like regular maintenance on irrigation pivot tires. It’s much easier than lugging a bigger compressor and generator across the hayfield.
I suppose it’s kind of a blessing and a curse, though. Since I know I’ll always have my trusty compressor at my disposal, I tend to procrastinate things like changing the tractor tire with the slow leak. I just know that every other day before I load the truck up for feeding, I have to hook my little compressor up to add some air to the tire. It’s kind of become my routine.
Now before you start speaking too much nay (I guess that’s what naysayers do), hear me out. As you might have guessed, the little yellow wonder machine isn’t particularly fast. It takes around five minutes to add 10 pounds of air to the front tire of my tractor. With that in mind, I always hook the compressor up to the tractor tire while I’m feeding my first load of hay. By the time I return for the second load, the job is done. It’s the model of half-hearted efficiency.
One recent Sunday afternoon, after I’d done my due diligence and attended church services with my wife, I headed back out the door to feed one last load of hay to the cows before I planned to semi-relax for the afternoon. My wife offered to help with the feeding, but with a little selfish magnanimity, I declined her offer. I knew if she stayed back at the house that she’d feel inclined, as is her nature, to fix a nice hot lunch, which would be ready for consumption about the time I finished with the chores and feeding.
I drove Old Chevy the 2-and-a-half miles to the stackyard and loaded up a couple of bales. Realizing that it had been a day or two since I’d aired up the offending tire, I hooked up the “little compressor that could” and headed out to pitch off the hay to the cows. It was a decent enough early-spring afternoon, and calving had been going very well. I fed the hay and tagged three new baby calves that had been born since I’d gone through the cows earlier that morning. The mamas were fairly good-natured, and I finished the chore with little fanfare. I returned to the stackyard and loaded up two bales for the next day. After loading, I took the tractor 150 yards down the road next to the corral where I could plug the block heater in for the night.
I jumped out of the tractor and trotted back up the road to fetch the truck. That’s when I noticed the carnage. Pieces of hard yellow plastic lay strewn all up and down the road to the stackyard. My mind began racing. Who could be to blame for this catastrophe? Since there was no mirror readily available, I wasn’t able to make out the face of the culprit, but I knew he’d be found out soon enough. Through my keen powers of deduction, I surmised it was the same rapscallion who, just two days earlier, had left the hose running in the horse pen for five hours because he was trying to save time while he grained the leppies. It was apparent that he’d left the little compressor attached to the tire while he loaded the hay and then proceeded to drive down the road, bouncing the contraption down the gravel road like a number one potato tumbling out of a spud truck on the highway.
Luckily, the battery was still in one piece, minimizing the financial damage of my negligence. A hundred and twenty-five bucks later, and through the miracle of modern marketing and my wife’s impressive ability to navigate Amazon (not the river), I had a replacement compressor on my doorstep on Tuesday afternoon. It was a good thing, too, because I noticed the front tire on the tractor was a little low.
