Here it is: the best weekend of the entire year.
Ma, Pa, all the brothers and practically the entire family are away at the Aluminium Farming Fair. I always get left behind because it’s a paid event and if there’s one thing Pa dislikes more than the family not doing things together, it’s wasting money. Best part is that they don’t think I can handle the farming by myself, so they hire some farmhands (seems weird considering the money things, but…). That gives me the place to myself for over two whole days. Peace at least…
And everyone always comes back happy as well. They get to spend the whole time looking at ute under tray draws and ute toolboxes and mostly stuff to do with utes, actually. I assume things haven’t changed since the few years since I’ve been left by myself. I used to just wander through all the shiny aluminium displays and wish I could find a quiet corner to read. That’s what I actually did at the age of ten: I managed to smuggle a book in, found a stall selling these massive toolboxes that had central locking and crawled inside one of them. Using my handy portable reading light and keeping an eye on the clock, I managed to get halfway through Homer’s Odyssey…before the toolbox was opened because someone wanted to inspect the inside.
That person was Pa. He…wasn’t happy. So that’s why I get left at home now. They get to have a great time with all of them sharing the same interests, and I can just read and study here in absolute peace. It’s the best time our family has, and I’m not even with them.
Maybe one day I should just go. Make an effort to learn about gas bottle holders and draw systems, to really try to see things from their perspective. But then, they’d never do the same for me, so why bother?