Tonight’s post is all about today’s Santa.

I bought this ornament a few years ago, after we spent a cold October weekend helping to pack up Fuzzy’s father’s farmhouse. At one point, all the combines and tractors were lined up, awaiting auction, and it was both so hopeful and so sad. To me, it spoke of the way rural small towns are disappearing, because family farms can’t compete with corporate factory farming, and the kids who grow up in those towns typically will do ANYTHING to get out.

If I’d had the cash, I’d have bought the farm, remodeled the house and barn, and turned it into a prairie writers’ retreat. After all, it was only half an hour from De Smet, the “Little Town on the Prairie” where the latter half of the Little House books take place.

Later that year, we took houseguests to the National Cowgirl Museum, and when I saw this ornament, I had to have it. It reminds me that behind my father-in-law’s gruff exterior there beats a truly good heart.

And while I have tractors on the brain, here’s a video to lighten the mood. It’s the “Santa Claus Boogie,” performed by – you guessed it – The Tractors: