I have always admired the big men in trucks, good and honest people who know how the world works, and who can rearrange it almost effortlessly. Vince Vecchio has tractors and trucks and understands soil and dirt. He came with his son Chad today, a big truckful of new soil for the badly eroded Pole Barn. And he smoothed the ground around the Pole Barn and cleaned it up.

It’s important to do this before the winter, the animals spend a lot of time in the Pole Barn and need a dry and level space to lie down and get out of the wind and snow, and especially, the freezing rain, the thing they hate the most.

I am one of those men who do not know how the world really works, or how it is put together and the big men have dazzled me for years with their ideas, their help, their tractors and their trucks. Vince, a neighbor, came over with his tractor when Simon died and buried him in the pasture. He would not take any money for that.