A Shocking Kindness

 Late Thursday afternoon, a tall man in jeans and a green seed cap appeared at my door and identified himself as Mike Rea. He said he had contracted to spray the field behind my house, wanted to notify me and would phone before he started.

A shocking kindness really, that has never happened before in the 36 years I have lived here.  And, after my set-to over the CAFO at the east edge of town last fall for the article in Free Inquiry, certainly improved my impression of the farming community. The spray, he said, was to combat three different kinds corn diseases, he named but I can’t. Moreover, he would try to select a day with an east wind, which would blow the residue across the river, and if it went that far, onto the lots back of Main Street.  

I calculated it would land in the river, sooner or later, with which he did not argue. That very morning my houseguests and I had checked it out and it looked pretty foul. He insisted it has been like that for a long time, with which I could not argue. I pointed out we humans have befouled all the surface water in the state.  We are pumping the aquifer dry.

“What are we going to do when it runs out?” I asked him. “Go out to Jake and Jackie’s and drink out of their pool?” He didn’t know. I don’t either, but I am certainly impressed with his thoughtful kindness.