In Southern Minnesota, my job was to pile sugar beets as they came in from the fields. Truck by truck, twenty-four hours a day, every day—unless it rained too much, and the vehicles got stuck.
The ideal height of a beet pile is twenty-eight feet. The lengths would eventually become one hundred and fifty yards. As the piles got high and long, I would walk amongst the snaking hills to find the best beets to take home as trophies.
Sometimes, I remembered the canyons along the border. There I would search for my prize. A rock unlike the others.
I remember there was a total absence of sound. I was in love with this silence. That is until the helicopters came or the soldiers would pass by— unless it rained too much and the vehicles got stuck. I would lay flat behind a shrub and watch them. If only I had a couple rockets, I would think. Maybe I would have the jump on them and I could make it back before the helicopters came?
Does it matter?
No. It’s just beets.
It’s more and more beets.