Wistful Wednesday : Grain Harvest

The small grain harvest is almost completed up here. I watched a combine out in a field on the prairie yesterday. How times have changed. One thing that stays the same is the dust and the irritating chaff.

When I was little the trashing or threshing crew would come through..neighbors helping neighbors. My Mother would bake and cook for days. I remember the excitement of all the equipment pulling into the yard, and the anticipation of all the really good food. The cakes and cookies!! My sweet tooth was ready! The men who helped had to be fed really good, it was hard work.

This is a photograph of my Grandfather D. The photo made me smile, it was taken when I was just a little girl in the 1950's. He is standing on top of the Thrashing/Threshing machine, to the left is the hay wagon piled high with sheaves of grain. To the right must be the grain wagon that would collect the grain after it was thrashed. Grandpa wore the same "Uniform" all his years.. a pair of bib overhauls, a long sleeved shirt, and his cotton cap..the one that looked like a train engineers cap..navy blue and white striped..a red hanky would be in one of his pants pockets..and inside the little pockets in the front of his bibs was a pencil, his cigarette papers, a pouch of tobacco and wooden matches. I always loved to watch him roll his own cigarettes, it was like watching an artist..the paper had to be held just right..then filled with just the right amount of tobacco..then he licked the paper and folded it over..and sometimes he twisted the end that he lit with a wooden matchstick. Grandpa lived well into his nineties:)