Well, we've put January behind us. Not such a great month for me, really. Oh, I've faced worse financially, so that part is more an irritating background noise than the 800 pound gorilla that it used to be. I didn't line up “winter work” for the shop. The last time that I did this, two jobs hit snags and I wound up with the shop tied up for a year and a half while I had to work on the Old Black Truck in the rain, etc.

More space would help—temporarily. It seems that this is typical in the tractor business. It must represent a challenge to service managers to keep their shops from becoming clogged with torn-down, immovable machines that have suddenly—for any number of reasons, usually financial—been relegated to “on hold” status.

Large dealerships can (and do, I suppose) just go ahead and finish these jobs. They shove the machine out the door, park it on the back lot, and carry the parts and labor until the customer can pay the bill and pick it up. Of course, I can't afford to do that. This is one of the more practical reasons (most are aesthetic) that I operate as a mobile service.

The tractor business . . . I suspect that most of us who do this aren't in it for the money. It's about as lucrative as raising groundhogs or growing mullein. Perhaps it's one of the last occupations that is friendly in an old fashioned way with a warm sense of community. This community extends well into Pennsylvania and down the Shenandoah Valley. It's basically a network of dealerships, salvage parts operations, mechanics, and other craftsmen who refuse to live in this century. It's a community where the folks still treat you well if you don't have a lot of money to throw around. This winter has been a good test of that feature.

Still, there were some good days. Among those was a visit to a farm in Loudoun County, Virginia, where I worked on an unrestored 1939 Farmall H in an old-timey barn build of rough-sawn oak. The long vertical boards of the walls are spaced about an inch apart, possibly due to shrinkage. The big east-facing barn door—big enough to allow a loaded hay wagon to enter—is open to a field of corn stubble and blue sky.

Once the sun passed the peak of the barn's roof and shone through the boards of the west wall, the inside of the barn became a surreal world of low, yellow, striped sunlight. It requires extra effort to concentrate in this environment. It was fun, though, like being in a 1940s movie directed by Fritz Lang, the director whose artistic work with light and shadow popularized the black and white medium long after color became the norm.

I volunteered for Haiti through an organization that I'm associated with. No dice. The air was stacked with circling aircraft backed all the way to Miami, all waiting to land at Port Au Prince. That's where I desperately wanted to be, dropped off in the thick of it—me, a hacksaw, a crowbar, and a hydraulic jack. I would suspend hygiene, subsist off of stored fat, and sleep out in the open if at all. Human carnage doesn't bother me if I'm helping to relieve it. I go to a special place during a rescue operation. I'll probably have another chance when some natural disaster strikes closer to home. I know that special place will be waiting for me.

So, there are certainly those who are worse off than me. It's not a bad winter—just a slow grind.

Then there are the “stable surfers,” an equestrian version of the couch surfer. Basically homeless, they “crash” in tackrooms and haylofts while picking up a few days' work. In comparison, I'm not really in trouble at all by today's standards. It's the essentially unpaid Traveling Mechanic column, now in its 13th year in Antique Power magazine, whose future is getting a bit shaky.

However, my column's problem is more one of prosperity than of want. While a few of the owners on my route have followed my advice and maintenance program with positive results, the majority would only call me when their old tractor finally stopped.

Some of these persist in this manner, considering my visits as part of their social life. More often, though, these poorly maintained machines become too unreliable and the customer purchases a brand new tractor. Shocked into reality by the amount of money they just spent, they then subscribe to my maintenance program.

What this basically means is that, these days, I change the fluids in a bunch of Kubotas, then I'm done for the season. While there are a lot of restored tractors around, finding old tractors that are still in actual use has become increasingly difficult.

I've adhered to the basic criteria of the column. 1) Photos aren't staged, 2) the tractors, situations, and other machines involve either machines I've worked on or found en route along the back roads. I'm finding that I'm having to expand my territory in order to find enough old tractors to fill three pages. In theory, I could charge the customer for the extra time and travel, but the reality is that this would price me out of the market. Since most of these old tractors are used more or less recreationally, the customer's option to just let it sit there is often viable. Thus, some of my expense is unrecoverable.

I'm not asking for a bailout, like the banks, etc.; just a tip now and then—a little more gas, another roll of film.

If you enjoy the Traveling Mechanic, drop a dollar bill in an envelope and send it along. If you send a self-addressed stamped envelope I'll send, for each dollar, an unpublished photo from the route. Send extra paper for commentary.

It's the same surplus photo deal that I've offered for about a year in Antique Power. The response has been mildly encouraging. Now, though, it has become a necessity if the column itself is to remain self sustaining.

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© 2002 tedkalvitis@yahoo.com