Earlier this afternoon, I stood with a leg on either side of our ladder, holding a large white motor. Pete, an older gentleman we had met through a lucky happenstance after our generator busted last week, tightened the bolts of the motor to the large steel pole we had got a few weeks ago. More bolts, more balancing on the ladder, taking the thing down, flipping a few parts, tightening the thing again, and Kerri, Pete, and I stood back. The wind turbine stood still. Pete gave it a slight nudge and it gave a great exhale like it had been holding its breath and then kicked into full gear.
The wind turbine was something we have been wanting since I got here nearly three months ago. We had ordered the kit. It came without a part. We ordered that part. We needed something to attach it to the pole. We ordered that one too. Forgot to get a pole. We bought it and it sat waiting next to the dog pen for a while. Something was always coming up with this stupid wind turbine and when we had days windy enough to rock the trailer, it was especially frustrating. Not to mention, the first person we had talked to about solar looked us up on a map from halfway across the country and told us we didn’t have enough wind (not true, by the way).
After the trials of the last few weeks, we needed something good. It felt like every day we’ve had a brand new crisis, between the generator and one of the trucks needing work and wires in the solar becoming undone (that one was just this morning). The turbine isn’t much. It’s a smaller one that stands at about eight or nine feet tall. The nose cone isn’t on, the power isn’t connected, and we’ll have to take it down in a few days to connect some additional nuts and bolts, but today was a major victory and one more step towards our vision.