Monday Close Up: Life on the farm

"Glen Larsen, 86, waits for his son Rex (not pictured) to unclog the hay mower-conditioner he was operating in Leland, Thursday, June 17, 2010. Larsen was born into a farming family and has been farming on the same land since his youth. (CLICK PHOTO FOR VIDEO)."

For my monthly story, a la Monday Close Up, I had the pleasure of hanging out with farmer Glen Larsen and his son Rex.

All I knew going into the story was that Larsen was an 80-something-year-old working on a 100-something-year-old family farm. Basically he hasn't moved off the family farm and has been working on it all his life.

I thought it was captivating, light and something different from my past stories.

After talking with Larsen on the phone, I headed down to his farm in Leland on Tuesday morning.

Because of his age, most of his time is spent on tractors and machinery.

So I was frustrated after my first day on the farm. For about seven hours I exhausted the scene as he sat on the same tractor all day long.

I knew I needed much more, so I made my way back two more times, once for an interview and once for some more stills and video. I wish I could have spent more time with him, alas that's how short our turnaround for our stories are.

The final piece can be read here and the multimedia can be viewed here.

More stills to come in a later post.

Enjoy.