NOTES FROM THE VAGABOND JOURNAL A VISIT TO RUGBY, NORTH DAKOTA JANUARY 17, 2003 - (5)

This is where it started: my first visit to the first community: Rugby, North Dakota, January, 2003. Why does one go to Rugby in January, you ask? If you want to see what a town is made of, you have to see it in the tough season, as well as the sweet, and January in Rugby is the tough season.

The biscuits and gravy

Clayton wanted to order have been all sold out so he settles for hashbrowns and toast and sausage or bacon. I order my usual - two eggs, two pancakes, two sausage patties. I end up giving Clayton a copy of my memoir, Curlew:Home, then later in the afternoon as I'm talking to Therese Rocheleau she says "Dad must be reading your book already. He said that this morning you ordered the same breakfast that you ordered on page 13 of the book...."

We talked over breakfast, Clayton and I did, about the project that brought me to Rugby. He enlisted the help of our waitress and others in the cafe to start a list of the people I should talk to. When we pushed our empty plates away, Clayton insisted on paying for my breakfast. I didn't want to try arm-wrestling the tab away from him because I know that, while these old fellows no longer have the strength they used to, slyness trumps strength every time. (When he bought me breakfast, that's when I knew for sure I had to give him a copy of my book.)

We stepped into the hallway of the sale barn and Clayton introduced me to the main auctioneer at the place, Ron Torgerson. I may have to do a piece on the sale barn, and Ron Torgerson would be at the center of it. I got his phone number. Clayton introduced me to a cattle buyer and farmer ("I'm a farmer first"), Ken Mattern, who gave me his phone number and his cell-phone number. Clayton and I watched cattle sell for a few minutes. A younger fellow was doing the auctioneering early in the day, selling the less desirable cattle, the old cows and those not properly finished.

"Watch those two buyers standing there at the edge of the ring, off to the side," Clayton told me. "When one of them makes a bid, he barely moves his hand." I watched. I saw a hand make just the flicker of a movement, he'd bid on the cattle in the ring. Another buyer sitting front and center with a little bit of plank table in front of him just barely nodded his head; he was bidding too. It was flicker of hand versus the slightest nod of head til one of the fellows looked away - the bidding was over - "SOLD!"

I gave Clayton a ride back to the motel, he invited me into the office to meet his daughter, and I had to sign my book for him.

To be continued....