www.flickr.comI can actually watch the grass growing. In a matter of days, it will be time for many of us to get out the mowers and "start your engines."
In the last years of his life, Dad spent a lot of time with his John Deere, trying to coax it to mow one more time, then again, one more time.
In the end it gave out, and I was somehow able to convince him that it was not unmanly to let somebody else cut the grass. For him, though, it was one more loss, one less thing he had to do. And Daddy needed things to do.
When I was back at the house for the funeral, the thing that made me break down and cry was that old John Deere lawn tractor, put away in its space in the back of the house. I knew he had spent so many hundreds of hours on it that they had formed a bond -- man and machine. It represented a contest of wills, I think, and for season after season, Dad won the battle. He sure got his money's worth out of the 1980-something mower, keeping it going for nearly 20 years.
When I'm tempted to complain about my two acres of land and the attendant mowing duties, I'll remember Dad and how important it is to have something to do. And I'll try to be thankful that I'm still able to get out there and do battle with the grass.
2 comments:
Nanny, you sure captured Daddy and the mower! =0 Is it still at the house? What will you be doing with it, Rita?
I told Rita yesterday not to bother trying to fix it. I tried everything and spent a lot of time talking to the guy at Wakefield's who had been helping Dad nurse it along all those years. It's done for. How I wish I could have bought him a brand new mower, but he would have protested. He would have kept tinkering with that one. It gave him something to do.
Post a Comment