Against all my better judgement, and because it's the right thing to do,
I have put my offer of giving a used tractor to my Quaker Meeting in PA to the House & Grounds Committee.
Who will meet with the Trustees since the the tractor will be used in the large cemetery and that "turf" literally comes under
the Trustees. I'm sure all churches have similar committees, so instead of just getting something done, and I am one of two people
involved in a discussion among more than a dozen who has even sat on the seat of a tractor. Sigh.
Big hearts, good hearts, not much understanding.
So here I am trying to describe the features and functions of a BX Kubota with a little loader to a very wide range of mostly white collar folk,
and I list the pto and the three point hitch and then the question comes back does it have a pto and three point hitch.
Sigh.
It has to be a very small tractor due to clearances in the graveyard. A small Massey or similar would do. BX is actually a tiny bit on the small side,
maybe a B or the equivalent one ton tractor.
When you drive over areas where you aren't sure where the bodies are, including some American Indians, buried more than 300 years ago,
there is a shared sense in the Meeting to tread lightly, in all senses of that term. If my little Massey had a loader it would be a perfect tractor but it's not going anywhere...
No excavator work, no snow removal; both contracted out. But snow cleanup is where the bucket helps and rear rake will help with getting gravel back on gravel roads throughout graveyard.
We had to plow 14 inches of wet snow out of there, all the way back of course..., so that an elderly member of the Meeting who had passed a few days earlier, a Federal judge who my Mother clerked for, could get a green burial on Sunday. I was all set to yell weather clause or something like that, the plow truck got stuck and had to be wrecker truck hauled out., but
I'm not up there and the call was made to get it done. And they did. Snow is snow, you deal with it. Just have to be careful in graveyards not to hurt gravestones pushing snow.
So I'm working hard to get my very first tractor back. It's quite a saga of first it was the church's tractor, then it was mine, now it's the church's again, and I want it back since it's
getting wrecked there. Maybe two hours use in four years. Just the wrong tractor for them and no loader. Square peg in a round hole and I aim to fix that.
So I'm looking at used BX's with MMM and loader.
But the point of all this, other than being a tractor story, is that regardless of my knowing what will work best there,
there must be a shared sense of agreement in this process. So it's in committee. And this process is bog slow.
Always has been, likely always will be, though email really helps.
Less night meetings. Maybe this sounds familiar at other churches some of you attend.
So here I am offering the gift horse/tractor to the church, and they are mulling it over.
Am hoping Uhaul makes a one way trailer I can rent in PA to haul my tractor back; my trailer is only one ton and the tractor
is a little over that. Too long a drive to worry about blowing a tire on a single axle trailer.
I hope that you and Ellen can continue to enjoy each other's company.
