He had driven up to that part of the state numerous times to see the prairie birds: harrier, bobwhite, woodcock, and snipe.  It was about a two hour drive, a very different habitat from the area he lived in.  It was flat, wide, a land where the sky was big. No tree stood in the way of the sun from rise to set. Corn stalks were the tallest, then came golden wheat fields and the low bush soybeans growing in mile-long rows.  Only a few houses scattered about made up what was called a town. He knew of only two places to stop for coffee and a sandwich.  It was best to pack yourself a lunch if you were going bird watching there. 

Now he was driving the distance to have a look at the new factory they were promising to build. It was going to be the size of ten football fields.  He had never even seen a football field, but had heard they were quite large.  His part of the world was different.  It was a forgotten land that was retiring into wildness. Small patches of swamp among forests of 100 year-old trees. Hillsides covered with bramble. Narrow bumpy township roads that were no long being maintained. Old barns built of oak during the 1800s were now surrounded by saplings of maple. 

As he drove he listened to the radio.  Some politician from Cleveland was complaining that the new factory should have been built in the city. Larger population, old factories that needed to be torn down and replaced. Lots of “people of color” who needed jobs.  David looked at the red baseball cap that was jammed into the pocket of his truck door. His buddy, John, had thrust it upon him. He had never actually worn the damn thing.  Red was too bold, not something you’d wear out bird watching. David was never bold anyway. Life was meant to be lived in quiet contemplation.

As the truck rolled along the state highway past electric high-tension towers, past newly plowed fields, and a blue sky with a few white fluffy clouds, Dave thought about the vegetable garden he had started at home.  It was a decent sized plot. He would need to use the rototiller to turn the soil. Of course this year he’d try again at growing a few tomatoes, mangoes, some sweet corn. His wife Julie liked various lettuces and greens.  Some cucumbers would be nice and some radishes.  He’d bought most of the seeds already. He needed to get the tomato plants, oh and a bag onion sets.

Gardening had not been easy lately.  Everyone was blaming it on “climate change.”  Too much rain—is what Dave was blaming it on. Too damn much rain. The tomatoes last summer were covered with mildew. Most of the radishes turned black and rotted in the soil. It was just a summer salad garden, but usually it was nice to bite into a bright red tomato you grew yourself.

It must be around about here.  Dave pulled the truck over and looked at his map. Route 6 between Interstate Highway 20. Yep, this was the place. He jumped out of the truck and had a look around.

Cornfields and soy fields. No barn in view. No houses. How could they build a factory out here?

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Dave was now lying in bed thinking about that day he drove out there.  The factory was built, opened and running. He had applied online and was hired.  He got the job. The place was a behemoth of robotics and little humans moving in-between.  

They called the factory WigetWear. A full two-hour drive from his home.  In all his days of bird watching there, he only went occasionally because it was so far away.  Desperation for a better paycheck made him drive it five days a week. He thought about himself and wondered how this could push him so far.  His wife was happy to see the paychecks. She could afford to put up a fence around the garden to keep the rabbits out. She had to build it herself because Dave had so few hours at home.  Two-hour drive to work, two-hour drive home. Eight hours of work a day, and sometimes a couple of hours overtime.  Not much time for family.

The job was tedious. As in brain numbing repetition. Oh, how the politicians had bragged about creating jobs. They never had to dodge robots while doing the same boring moves hour after hour, day after day. It was as if he were trying to imitate the speed and efficiency of the robots.  He had become a machine competing with a machine. It could drive a man to drink—more.  He wondered about his future. Was this going to be like Lordytown? A famous factory that ran for about ten years then shut down.   A decade later they re-opened it, then a few years later it was shut down again.  Overproduction was their excuse.

Dave’s co-workers were saying a developer was building apartment complexes around the factory.  They were eagerly signing up to see if they could get a space. “I’m not making this drive all winter,” one of them said.  Dave felt sympathetic, but he remembered something from high school history class. Didn’t there used to be “factory towns?”  The bosses owned the factory and the housing. Was this what they meant?  He’d heard that some of the apartments were already completed.  One summer day, before work, Dave arrived early and decided to take a drive nearby to see.

The buildings looked nice. There was a park in the middle of the cluster. No place for gardening, but there was a playground with swings, a climbing castle, small trees and a few picnic tables. That would be nice for his four-year-old Molly.  But could they really live there?  He pulled out his new phone and took a few photos to show Julia.  They could keep their land and the trailer they were presently living in for summer vacations and retirement.

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After work, on the long drive home with the radio playing his favorite country tunes, Dave did some thinking. The kind of thinking a person can do when you’re off by yourself and you can admit the truth to yourself. He’d always kinda liked living in the country, off on the edge of civilization. Not so caught up in the craziness of that world.  Just close enough to get the good things you need, but not the crazy bad stuff. If he had to spend every day with the robots and the men living like machines, what would his thoughts come to? What would he be? He just wondered.