Pro athletes talk about “wanting it more”. How it makes the difference during key events.

My uncle wanted it more. If you put a thousand different people in his position, no one else would have done what he did.

***

The situation was bad, but even my stubborn uncle had to have limits. We couldn’t leave a few grand worth of corn to soak overnight. We couldn’t transfer the corn, the gravity wagons would just spill their contents on the muddy field. We couldn’t even disconnect the good wagon. I desperately wanted him to call it quits for the day and return after the rain.

He pulled the hitch pin, freeing the tractor from the useless wagon, and motioned for us to get in. Wordless he drove through the field and onto the road home. As we pull into the long farmhouse driveway he starts giving orders. “Chartreuse”, he said, “I’ll drop you off at the shop. Cole and I will hitch up the 3 point crate and come back for you. Get two screw jacks, two bottle jacks, all the chalk-blocks you can find, and a few shovels. When we get back to the shop, start loading everything but leave room for the generator and the arc-welder. We’re gonna fix this before midnight.”

Cole and I nodded. Arlen was a good boss, but he was hard-headed when he set goals. Fixing the wagon in the rainy dark mud would be hard, but changing Arlen’s mind would be harder.

A half hour later I found myself squeezed back into the tractor for the short wet journey back to the wagon. First priority was to pitch a tarp-tent. Not for us, of course, it was to keep the antique arc-welder dry.

Cole and I grab shovels and jacks then approach our chosen wheels. I slap a few blocks into the mud beneath the axle, near where the CV joint would be on a car, and set up the bottle jack. Small bubbles gurgle from the edges of the wood as I crank the handle. When the jack maxes out, I collapse it, stack a few more blocks underneath, and resume cranking. I'm not so much jacking the wagon up as I am pressing wood into the ground. The mud swallows block after block, but the axle finally starts to lift. I probably laid down enough blocks to hit the hardpan. The wheel won’t move freely, but I don't have any extra blocks. Cole is in the same situation.

Meanwhile, Arlen connects the generator to the tractor, then the welder to the genny. He sees us standing there-blockless-and says, “Get to shovelin’!”

There are few things in life that feel as ineffectual as shoveling mud. It's all slush and suction. I built a little dam with my excavations to prevent the wheel hole from backfilling with rainwater. Using the shovel as a pry-bar I successfully align my wheel.

"Break time." Arlen says, his equivalent of humor. He lays on his back and shimmies through the muck under the wagon axle. We hand him tools as he needs and reposition the tires. After a minute or two of fiddling he hollers, "good'nuff for government work. Start ‘er up."

I flick on the comically oversized light switch that functions as the welder’s on-off toggle, and hit hums to life. Arlen immediately strikes an arc but let's it die. Then he strikes another arc but let's it die just as quickly. His fixed-shade helmet leaves him working in double-darkness. I move to the downwind side of the wagon and huddle next to Cole. It doesn't block any rain but it blocks the wind a bit.

"That lightning is going strong," he said. “Think it’s dangerous?”

I dismiss his concerns with a gesture, then immediately feel a vibrant, agonizing pulse shoot through my body. "SHIT!" I yell. "I got struck."

Cole laughs.

"No, seriously!" I panic, “Get off the ground!!!” I hop onto the wagon wheel hoping the rubber will sufficiently insulate me when the next lethal strike comes. We’re in the middle of an open field, in a raging storm, and the tallest thing for a literal mile in every direction is an ungrounded metal wagon.

Cole is still laughing at me when his back arches. Electricity is playing through his body like a marionette.

"LIGHTNING" he screams. He scrambles for a hand hold and climbs on the tire next to me.

We both start hollering to Arlen trying to warn him of his impending death, neither one of us brave enough to descend from our safety and alert him.

Eventually, Arlen wriggles out from under the axle and sits upright in the mud. “Quitcher caterwauling!” he bellows. "It's not lightning. It's the welder." Realization dawns on us. "It's shocking me more than you! Stop jumping around like kangaroos and let me finish."