The old plow with its creaking wheels and wicked tines once had the sacred duty of preparing the earth to receive the elements of our daily bread, food for the birds and animals, generate the life-giving nitrogen in grasses and legumes.
The driver was out in the open and unprotected from the elements. The seat might have been padded in some way, but it would have been appallingly uncomfortable. The motion of the wheels would have jarred every aching bone in the driver's body, and the whole apparatus would have shuddered from one end to the other every time it encountered resistance in the uneven stony ground of Lanark.
Now its working days are over, and the old plow rests easy but somehow forlorn by the pond. It's a cherished sculpture seen from the kitchen windows, a pleasingly rounded and shaped contraption of rust and iron, but it's a reminder too, that however difficult this life seems to be at times, our lot is easier than it used to be.