Random reminder

Press, 15 May 1985, Page 49

Random reminder

MULTUM IN PARVO Farmers seem to be divided into two distinct groups. There are those who, at the drop of a tweed hat, will ramble on at length on the disastrous state of the economy, the scandalous price of new cars, the backbone of the nation, the appalling weather, and some more on the economy. There, are others who seem to have lost the art of forming words. The latter type was a description of the fellow doing the fencing job. He was good at his job, and because the fence was on his neighbour’s property — a matter of a deal resulting in him owing money, or work, to his neighbour — he was taking special care in ensuring that the posts were straight and true, that the droppers were regular, and that the wires were equally spaced and strained. He stood back with pride, admiring the fence inarching straight as a die down to the road-fence. He waved to his neighbour when he passed on the tractor en route to shifting the sprinlder heads, and also noted the neighbour’s wife vanishing down the gravel road in a swirl of dust in the new car. Now the neighbour’s task took only 10 minutes, but the change around the fencing job on his return was immense. The first obvious thing was the marks on the road. These led to a gaping hole in

the road-fence, with a few broken heads of the pampas grass wind-break waving on the now freed barbed wire. Two parallel and meandering tracks, reminiscent of a speedway demonstration, led around the paddock, interrupted only by the railway sleepers lying amongst the clover. The trail swept in an arc, through a gate, and back on to the road, where the dust was still settling. The neighbour stopped the tractor, and wandered through the new, and unwanted, entrance to his paddock. The fencer wondered whether or not he should faint. Or die. “I see some-one’s been through the fence.” “Ahh - yeah.” “Who was it?” The embarrassment was total. If he had gone redder, he would have set fire to his hat. His boots, the ground, the horizon, and his boots again received close scrutiny, while he considered carefully his reply. “I think I saw your wife in here,” finally emerged. The neighbour vanished in a cloud of diesel to inspect his now used car, while the fencer stooped to his work with the fervent wish that Mr Spock had beamed him up long before he had ever set foot in the paddock.