Loading Hay Bales on a Kansas Ranch
This is one of the jobs I tried, loading fresh-cut hay on a blistering hot early September day in Kansas.
I'll never forget my attempt at loading hay bales on that ranch.
As I recall, one day a pickup truck with two young men about my age came into the gas station to get some gas. As I pumped their gas we started talking. They told me that they were going to be loading hay bales onto trucks tomorrow. They asked me if I had ever done that kind of work. I said no. They said that they could use some help. They asked me if I was interested in helping. I asked how much it paid. They said $2 per hour. Wow! Two times as much as I was making.
They invited me to meet them at 6 AM the next morning. I agreed. The next morning I arrived and we started tossing bales of hay up onto a flat-bed truck. I thought that I could handle the job. I was wrong.
Right now, I'd like to pause and salute and show respect for those young ranch hands. They are a hardy breed. You cannot know how hard their work is until you try to do what they do. Hats off to them!
I thought that I was strong. I was wrong.
One person slowly drove the flatbed truck, one young man stood up on the flatbed and stacked the bales as we tossed them up. I think that the bed was over four feet above the ground. The bales must have weighed around 100 pounds each. From the start, I had a difficult time tossing them up that high. The bales were slippery and hard to grab hold of. The binding twine cut my hands.
At one point, as we moved along, I grabbed a bale, and there six inches away, staring me in the face was a snake. It had been packed in that bale. It freaked me out. I yelled out in surprise and dropped the bale. Everyone laughed at me. They said that snakes getting caught up in bales was not uncommon, buy the way, watch out for them.
The hours passed. As we moved along, I struggled to keep up, the hay bales were piled higher and higher on the flatbed. We had to toss the bales higher and higher. Finally, I just could not toss them high enough, and that made the other boys laugh at me and ridicule me. I had to keep up. I could not.
The rule was, "If you can't do the job, go home." I managed to work for about four hours. I got $8 cash and a handshake for my efforts. (It cost me $2 in gas to get to and from the job. I netted $6.) My hands were bloodied and I was sunburnt. I was covered with Kansas dust and hay. I had trouble breathing from the hay dust. I was so sore that I could hardly bend over. I'll never forget that experience. Everyone should try it. You'd be humbled.
I'll continue to share more stories. I hope you enjoy them.
It's been an interesting journey.
