Contrasts

I'm going to be straight with you.  Today was a hard day. It wasn't our longest day, but we clocked in twenty four miles, but it wasn't the distance.

The wind was out of the northwest at between fifteen and eighteen miles per hour, and it was relentless.  Not right in the face, but off the starboard quarter just enough that it did a pretty good job of pushing us around.  The traffic was also pretty heavy, and when a truck passed it was a little challenging to know where to lean.

You'd lean into the wind as it approached, try to shift back to upright when it was alongside, and then guess how the wake was going to combine with the wind as it blew past.  Neither of us was knocked over, but there were moments of choice words a number of times.

On the upside, neither of us had our hats blown off which is an improvement over previous wind rich days.  Also, the sun came out in the afternoon and dispensed with the sideways blowing mist that accompanied us through the morning.

Beauty and Dashed Dreams - US Highway 6 Near Nappanee, IN

I finally took an opportunity to snap a few photos.  I liked this one because of the contrasts.

The yellow wildflowers are growing in a corn field that hasn't been planted.  By this point in the growing season, corn is generally about knee high, but the small number of fields we've seen planted are either just germinating or quite a bit shorter than expected for this time of year.

These wildflowers represent the dashed hopes, dreams, and years of hard work by a farmer.  As the days pass, and the soil remains saturated due to the unusually we spring that has occurred all through the corn belt, these fields are less and less likely to produce a crop.  

Walking through mile after mile of unworked fields,  I feel a deep sadness for the folks that have bet their livelihood on bringing in a crop this year but are going to have to put off those hopes until next season. It's hard to imagine the resilience that it must take to deal with this kind of setback. Some won't recover, but those that do are going to have a tough time over the coming eighteen months.

It makes our little wind problem, which is predicted to be completely resolved tomorrow, seem like a minor annoyance in comparison. I'm deeply grateful for the perspective that the Universe has shared with me over the course of this pilgrimage.