I spend an ungodly amount of time in a tractor cab during the fall. Outside of sleeping, eating at odd intervals, and doing maintenance, my life is lived in a cab.

The tractor radio is my steady companion. Every spring and fall, I spend a lot more time listening to the radio than Pam. The rest of the year, I listen to my wife because that’s what a successful husband does.

I listen to a lot of news. (Spoiler alert, it’s bad.) Weather reports are must-listen radio when everything you do depends on weather.

I follow the markets. Following the markets means following the mind of Donald Trump. In the dark cavern that is Trump’s mind, we know with certainty that nothing is certain. Ask a cattle farmer about the fun ride they’ve had.

When I want to give my brain a break, I listen to music. The buttons take me from old country to new country to pop. One night I decided to use my search button to seek out “oldies.” I had this revelation. Oldies aren’t the 50s and 60s anymore. Oldies are the 80s and 90s. As if I needed another reason to feel old.

I need my polka fix every day. In my part of the world, that begins with KNUJ, broadcasting from the big city of New Ulm. At 11 a.m. is Dinner Bell Hour with Tom Wheeler spinning the records. Well, he’s probably not spinning records. But I like to picture Tom leaning over the turntable. Sundays offer a whole afternoon of polkas and waltzes with Amy Zents.

On Saturdays, Katie’s Polka Party is on KMSU, the public radio station out of Mankato. Katie Jo Findley is the excitable host.

What Tom, Amy, and Katie Jo do is let me feel like a kid again. I grew up with the barn radio set by my dad and the kitchen radio set by my mom, both to KNUJ, the Polka Station of the Nation.

I have a tortured memory of my mom trying to teach me to polka dance in the kitchen. Years later, “dancing” with my wife, Pam said to me with a low level of frustration, “You really can’t keep a beat.” I suspect my mom knew that earlier and just never told me.

Regardless, there was lots of oompah music in the World That I Grew Up In. Before acquiring the freedom that came with a driver’s license, wedding dances were a primary way to get off the farm.

I had lots of cousins marrying with the inevitable dance at the Orchid Inn following wedding Mass at St. Mary’s. There would be a rock/country band playing most of the evening. But there always had to be at least two sets of old-time, aka oompah music.

We called it “old-time.” There had to be a time when it wasn’t old. Was it ever called “new-time?” And now, is it “older-time” music? These are the kind of questions that come to mind after hours on a tractor.

I remember being young, and little shocked to see my parents swirling around the dance floor. They were, after all, parents. I primarily knew them doing chores. My dad milked, my mom picked eggs, and they both fed animals. My mom also fed people. Seeing them dance seemed an amazing frivolity.

Back to the tractor, there are times when your focus wanders from the agrarian task at hand. It was one of those moments when Katie Jo was spinning “What Do They Do In Minnesota.” I knew the catchy tune, but never really listened to the lyrics.

The song wonders what Minnesotans do in the “cold, cold, frosty wintertime.”

“Now when it’s warm in summer, they go fishing every day. They don’t have time to make love. They’re busy making hay.

But when old frosty winter comes, they do not fish or hay. They do the chores and stay indoors and make love all the day.”

Say what?

Those are quite racy lyrics. Not that they are untrue. All those big families back then had to originate somewhere. But there on the tractor, going up and down the field, Katie Jo was forcing me to confront my parents’ sexuality. I’m only sixty-nine and not sure I’m ready for that.

With music, the melody always leads, and the lyrics follow. It is the tune after all, that causes our toes to tap and our head to sway. I’ve always thought it would be great fun to put words I write to music once. But then I remind myself that I can’t keep a beat, so forget that.

A couple of other polka lyrics come to mind. There is that saddest of songs.

“In Heaven, there is no beer. That’s why we drink it here. And when we’re gone from here, our friends will be drinking all the beer.”

I have to admit to feeling resentment towards my friends when I hear that.

There are polkas that are wonderfully simple, and don’t require a lot of mental band width.

“E-I-E-I-E-I-O (E-I-E-I-E-I-O)

E-I-E-I-E-I-O (E-I-E-I-E-I-O)”

I could sing that all day, a type of primal therapy.

“Who Stole the kishka? Someone stole the kishka.

Who stole the kishka? From the butcher’s shop.”

A true crime that will never be answered.

Then there’s this quite catchy polka that needs a rewrite:

“Oh, I don’t want her, you can have her,

She’s too fat for me,

She’s too fat, she’s too fat, she’s too fat for me.

She’s a twosome, she’s a foursome,

If she’d lose some, I would like her more-some.”

Let’s be honest, in the era of me-too and body shaming, those lyrics need to go the way of the Confederate flag.

May I offer an alternative?

“Oh, I don’t want her, you can have her,

She’s too smart for me,

She’s too smart, she’s too smart, she’s too smart for me.

She’s a scholar, she is learned,

I’m too dumb, she’s too smart, she’s too smart for me.”

Okay, that needs some work.

— Randy Krzmarzick farms on the home place west of Sleepy Eye, where he lives with his wife, Pam.