Many Friday nights all throughout the summer I spend travelling along many bumpy roads, all across Southern Ontario, stopping at 15 different locations over a course of a season. Touring in a big truck towing a fifty three foot long trailer behind it carrying two tractors a long with a crew of people, including drivers, a mechanic and family supporting them. You may wonder what I’m talking about, that is tractor pulling. Each event is totally different from the next, but some things are always the same. Some of these events have fairs with rides and all their colourful blinking lights on them but many don’t, they just have a simple food booth and the track. The roaring crowds cheering on their favourite kind of tractor from John Deere to Ford to International. The announcer repeating the same information about each tractor and its driver week after week. Yet the best thing about tractor pulling is the thick black smoke exploding from the tractor as it is departing from the starting line, towing the enormous sled behind it. The rumble from the engine over powering the noise of voices in the background. As the tractor reaches the end of the track, the crowd begins to cheer and shout. If the tractor passes three hundred and ten feet, the announcer shouts, "Full Pull" over the speakers, making the crowd gain enthusiasm.
A good evocation of time and place. Very clear images and a use of the other senses as well.
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