I wasn't quite old enough to ride a bicycle yet, but I had the next best thing. For Christmas when I was five years old, Santa brought me an orange pedal tractor. Back then, it was made from steel and could withstand anything I put it through, which was a lot. It had a small hitch on the back that I used to haul away branches, just like Grandpa did with his tractor. I felt like a farmer in the making.
Mom would later say that she could hardly get me out of it. I would ask her to bring me and Grandpa our lunches so we could eat on our tractors, as there was always a lot left to do before the day was over.
On the side of my tractor was a small bar that served no real purpose. It was something my imagination turned into a lever, like the ones Grandpa used to go forward or backward. The only problem was that if I wanted to go backward, I'd have to get out, lift it, and turn it around to go in the same direction that Grandpa was going.
At the end of a long day, I would park my tractor on the front porch, anxiously awaiting the next day when I could climb back in and head out to do my chores. Then one day, the unthinkable happened. I opened the door, and my tractor was gone. I screamed for my mom, who thought something horrible had happened as she tried to make sense of my frantic cries. "It's gone," I said through crocodile tears. "My tractor is gone!"
After assuring me that we would find it, we searched for over five blocks. Then I saw my orange tractor sitting on someone else's porch. Mom recognized the family who lived there, and she said there was a little girl older than me whom she described as a special little angel. She explained that "special kids don't always know what they're doing is wrong." "I'm sure she didn't mean to take your tractor," she said as we knocked on the door.
Another mom answered, smiling warmly and asking what we needed. When she saw me sitting in my tractor, she understood immediately. She called for her daughter and asked if she had taken my tractor, but the girl hesitated at first. Then she admitted that she wanted it, so she brought it home.
The mom apologized, and the little girl ran back into the house crying. On our way home, as Mom walked in silence, I had an idea. I asked her if it would be okay for me to play with the girl sometime. I wanted to take my tractor over and let her ride it while I pushed her alongside on my scooter so that she wouldn’t go too far. Mom thought that was a great idea and arranged it with the girl’s mom.
About eight years later, my orange tractor had become too small for me to sit in, and it ended up in the garage along with countless other toys I had accumulated over time. One day, I dusted it off and pushed it to the little girl's house. She was sitting on her porch, playing silently until she saw me coming up the path with my tractor.
“Mine,” she exclaimed, “my tractor!” Her mom came out, wondering what was going on until she saw me and the orange tractor. “Yes,” I said, “it’s your tractor now.”
Some years later, as I passed by her house, I would see my old tractor in a corner, surrounded by stuffed animals and other toys. She might have grown too big to sit in it, but she never lost the love she felt for it. As for me, I have a big tractor now that once belonged to Grandpa, and every so often, I look around to see if my little orange tractor is following me, pushed by a silent angel.
Mike 2025
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