Mowing the Lawn

One of the many down sides of my sons leaving the house is the redistribution of Household chores. The one I received the pleasure of doing today was mowing the lawn. This is one I happily gave up many years ago to my industrious son Kyle. It had been a month since it was mowed…The grass was very tall. Now I tried for a while to rationalize that even grass is a living thing (it grows) and part of God’s creation, and thus what right do I have to destroy it. In fact shouldn’t I nurture it to its fullness…Then I saw the neighborhood association watchdog driving around and realized that the freedom of a couple of weeds and grass don’t amount to a hill of beans in the grand scheme of the homeowners association. So I got out the mower…..

Finally figuring out that I needed to prime it…This is just not intuitive without instructions. And since I had delegated this chore many years ago, I have happily not revisited it until today. Finally figuring that out….I come to realize there is no gas in the mower…..duh….ok so the weeds get a reprieve….for 15 minutes. I am undaunted. I go to the gas station (my car happened to be low on gas as well – I love the synchronicity of it all.) and fill up. Back to the house, I fill up the mower without spilling too much gas on myself…(note to self, do not grill food tonight with these clothes before washing).

Anyway, I finally figured out all the particulars of how the machine worked….and away we went. My god the power in my hands….mowing down, destroying grass that came in my wake. Then I say one little sunflower among the weeds, but it was too late, it had fallen victim to the killing machine known as lawn mower. I am living with the circle of life concept now.

I made my away around the back yard heading to the front yard. The gate door could not open because the dirt had built up around it so high that it could not swing open more than an inch. Good to thwart fat burglars, and keep the dogs in, but bad for use as a fire exit or to get the mower through….This meant I had two choices…..walk the machine around the back to the other fence door, or get a shovel and shovel out the dirt….I decided, since I was communing with nature today, ,I would shovel….so I shoveled the dirt to a point I could open the door…..I worked up a good sweat…in fact I was sweating so much I kept sweating even after I showered off later…..(of course maybe I just didn’t dry myself well).

Anyway, right now..I am thinking that instead of a game Farmville on Facebook, there should be a game called cityville, where you vie for tickets to the US Open, theatre, and Opera. One really good thing about this event is that I don’t feel the need to go the gym today. This was a healthy workout!!