Work > The Accident

This piece represents a specific childhood memory. I was probably 6 or 7 years old. Living in the country in a house next to the highway. Playing with my Tonka truck on the edge of the lawn very close by the edge of the road on a hot summer day. Getting as much dirt on my clothes as I could, very likely fighting with my brothers and doing my best to wreck the truck.

Suddenly there was a loud roar and a screech and a bang. A pick-up pulling a horse trailer had come over the hill and down the highway much too fast. The driver lost control and the whole party ended up in the creek not 50 feet from where I was sitting.

So far as I recall, everyone emerged from the wreckage just fine, including the horses.

Though the work illustrates a specific event, it is also very much intended to act as a metaphor for many of the changes that have had an effect on me over the years since that day.

Ken Ragsdale

Statement
2021