Just One Cigarette Butt....just one...

Simplicity.....ah, simplicity. Life is only complicated if you choose to make it that way. I tell everyone who asks that I live a simple life because I choose to.....little does anyone know it's also because that's all I can do. My life has always been like a stream running down from the hills. There is no map for where the water should go. It just follows the path of least resistance. I'm not necessarily proud of that fact but then, I have relatively few regrets.

I do regret hating math so much. I regret hating math so much that while sitting with my college adviser I told him I would take any degree that didn't require college algebra. He told me there were no degree plans that didn't include college algebra. At this point I should have given it all up but that was before I learned the art of following the path of least resistance. I went to college for three years, avoiding college algebra the whole time, until there were no other classes I could take without the requisite college algebra. My education kind of stalled out at this point and after searching for other degree plans I dropped out for a while....a long while. I wasn't too upset about this because every full time job I had required a college degree and I HAHA, did not have one, snigger snigger. 

When I watched Jamie, my oldest son, walk the stage at Texas A&M to receive his degree in accounting, I became embarrassed with myself. I resolved then to get back in school and graduate before Cody, my youngest, walked across that same stage. I achieved that goal exactly one semester before Cody graduated. Had I not approached that stinking algebra requirement with a determined vengeance I wouldn't have made it. I started back to school with the first algebra required course in my old degree plan. I aced it with an A in the class. I did this because the first night of class (which was a night class made up of old losers like me) the prof asked how many were in the class at this point of life because of algebra. Every student raised his hand. (It is proper to say 'his' because the class was all men. According to an expert, my older sister, women just naturally understood algebra.) I'm sorry for wandering so much. I didn't get enough sleep last night. Anyway, on the first night of that class, the prof told us we wouldn't go any further until all of us understood....and appreciated algebra. It worked! I walked away from that first class wondering why it took so long to get it, especially since I used algebra every day in my work.

Well, that was a bit of a detour but wasn't it fun? I thought it was. The story is supposed to be about simplicity. I am a bit of an expert on simplicity. I've never tried to keep up with the Joneses...or the Smiths or anyone else. If my needs were met and my family safe, I was content. Years ago Debbie commented that she wished I wasn't so cotton-picking content. After a train wreck of a year in 1993, I decided Debbie was right. I needed to be more aggressive about our future so I got busy and advanced up the corporate ladder until I was one step above my ability to perform. There I stayed until I retired....at which time I resumed my quest for simplicity.

Examples of simplicity for me include sweeping the driveway and curb after mowing because it makes me feel good. My Dad was a stickler for neatness and his home and yard always resembled a military base. I liked that look and have tried to keep it up in my own home and yard. I don't like the noise of a leaf blower and the simple act of sweeping allows me to pursue my favorite pastime, day dreaming.

Another example of simplicity is choosing where to go on vacation. After year's of hit and miss vacation ideas I decided that sitting on my patio in a rocking chair and admiring Debbie's Texas garden was better than packing up to go anywhere. I have no travel in my bucket list....in fact, I really don't have a bucket list. Why fill up a bucket with things that will cause stress until they're achieved?

Oh, and here's the thought that caused me to begin this story. When we first moved into our house here in north Hurst, I was out sweeping my curb after mowing. I swept up a cigarette butt right at the start of my driveway. It irritated me at first but then there was another one the next week...just one little cigarette butt. This has continued for as long as I've been sweeping here at Highland Crest Drive. One little cigarette butt every time I sweep. My boys, in an attempt to keep me alive longer now forbid me from working in my yard. I wondered one day if the lawn crew had ever noticed that cigarette butt. I walked out to the end of my driveway the day the crew was supposed to arrive and there it was....one simple little cigarette butt. The scenarios in my daydream movies conjure up all kinds of ideas about who puts it there, why my driveway...and on and on. You see, if I didn't live a simple life I wouldn't have time to think about it. I probably would have never noticed it after the first time I saw it but now, every time I go to the mailbox or walk down the street to see my old friends Charley and Don, I check on that cigarette butt. It's always there. I should write a book.....

Imagination and Rodeo Clowns

What started out to be a warm Sunday morning has now turned into a cold, gray, and windy Sunday afternoon. Debbie and I came home after church and brunch today with happy thoughts of her working flower beds and me working in my wood shop. Of course we had to take care of a traditional Sunday activity we like to call "nap time" first. Since Debbie gave up this practice several years ago it's up to me to keep the tradition alive. I never sleep more than 45 minutes during my nap. I don't know why. Even if I have nothing at all planned for the day I can't seem to stay asleep for more than 45 minutes. As I wandered back into our den after my nap I found Debbie stretched out on the sofa with the remote in her hand. I was about to ask why she wasn't outside when I glanced out to see the change in weather. Not wanting to get caught up with a movie I went on outside.

It wasn't all that cold in my shop but it was getting that way quick. I decided I would go shopping instead. It's getting dangerously close to Christmas and I haven't bought a thing yet. I went out to my truck, climbed in and decided it was too windy to go shopping. I ran a couple of errands instead then came on back home. As I got out of my truck I noticed the really sweet lady across the street trying to rake leaves. Afraid she had gone bonkers I figured I better go over to check on her. The leaves were blowing off the trees and the roof faster than she could keep up. My carefully worded inquiry into this craziness was explained as she told about her little girl wishing for a big pile of leaves to play in as she was taken in for a nap earlier. The little girl is an amateur napper and was still asleep. Her mother was out in the cold wind trying to make her little girl's wish come true. That was so sweet I had tears in my eyes. No, I'm not a sentimental sissy. I just got dust in my eyes from the wind...yeah, that's what it was. I would have helped her rake up a big pile of leaves but I didn't want to take away from her special time....so I went back home wishing I had already stocked up on fire wood. Today would have been a good day for a nice fire in the fireplace.

I was reminded of a similar cold, gray, and windy day sixty plus years ago when my brother Glenn and I had watched the televised rodeo at the Fort Worth Fat Stock Show. We really enjoyed the bull riding because those bulls could launch an unsuspecting cowboy pretty far into the air. There were clowns who would distract the bull while the cowboy shook off the cobwebs and staggered out of the rink. We loved those clowns. We loved them so much that after the rodeo was over we went outside and played "rodeo clown". We liked to name our made up games. In our minds we were two sage rodeo clowns who knew how to really work a bull. We would squat, then jump up and run while dodging the imaginary bull. We would grab its horns and jump up over the bull. If we got in a bind we would run and dive headfirst into the barrel. The bull would ram the barrel of course and we would get thrown out and land on the cold ground. I can't remember having so much fun. We played all afternoon and came inside just before our Dad got home from work. We weren't supposed to play in the front yard. We had a big back yard for playing but had we played back there no one would have been able to watch our brave but humorous antics. We walked inside and found our older sister Cindy sitting on the sofa and looking out the big picture window. She asked us, "What exactly were you two morons doing out there?" We couldn't believe she couldn't see we were rodeo cowboys risking our lives to keep the bull riders safe. She said we looked silly at best and insane at the least. She was so embarrassed for us. I guess she didn't see the charging bulls like we did. Girls don't have any imagination at all. I feel sorry for them.

Cold, gray, and windy afternoons make me think back on being a kid and what all we did to keep from being bored on those days. On days like this I am embarrassed a lot.

Just Brakes....and headlight rims

 When I turned sixteen my dad bought what I considered to be my car although it was bought for the whole family to share. Aside from my dad, my older sister Cindy was the only licensed driver in the family. The car was a three speed transmission with overdrive...on the floor. My sister ruined two really good clutches trying to learn how to drive it. When my dad found out she had been driving around town in third gear he banned her from driving it. She wasn't disappointed. He did however, buy her a car of her own and it had an automatic tranny. It also had a 348cu in. engine with a 4 barrel carburetor. She couldn't afford to drive it much but at least the family second car was safe. Her's was a 1958 Chevy Impala painted kind of brown, almost orange....you know the color if you remember Chevy's from the 50's. I don't mind admitting I was a bit irritated that "my" car was a nearly worn out 1953 Studebaker Champion painted baby blue.....it had a straight six in it with a maximum speed of about 45mph. It also had 4 wheels on it but that is where the comparison ended. I digress....

This short story is about maintaining old cars. At the tender age of sixteen I had helped my dad rebuild the motor of an old Chevy pickup for my Grandpa, helped pull the clutch out of a Studebaker (see above), not once but twice, and helped rebuild the transmission of the same Studebaker. I had never done anything on my own. My Dad, who was a mechanical genius, had supervised everything I had done on a car. After the arrival of the '58 Chevy though he kind of lost interest in the Studebaker and told me to keep it running. I was tickled to be in total control of "my" own car. Daddy said Cindy was a girl and shouldn't be working on cars so he did all the repairs, all the washing, all the waxing....he was in love with that Chevy.

Stepping back a bit I have to say I saw the Studebaker sitting in the driveway for the first time when my parents drove Cindy and me home from a two week stay in Belton. We had gone down to help my aunt Dovie, who was slowly dying from cancer. I think Cindy helped my aunt and uncle quite a bit. I helped my cousin Donnie stay in trouble. I considered this a help though because we were never causing trouble at home. Donnie had a car and we used it...a lot. Anyway, when we turned the corner into our neighborhood and I saw that Studebaker sitting in the driveway, I was dumbfounded. I couldn't believe I had a car, even if it was a dull gray odd looking thing...definitely not a Chevy but by golly it was a car!

The next morning my dad went back to work and I got busy washing and waxing that car. I realized as I applied the wax that the color wasn't gray. It was light blue with an ivory colored top. It was beautiful! I bet I put four coats of wax on that Studebaker that day. My little brother Glenn helped and by the end of the day that car was glistening. My dad came home from work and was surprised the old gray car he bought wasn't gray at all. He was almost as happy as Glenn and I. 

We tinkered, we tuned up,  we washed and waxed some more until we felt an ownership of the Studebaker. We didn't know at the time the Studebaker would still be a part of the family today. My brother has it now at his home. He still likes to work on old cars...I don't! It's been in our family for 55 years. 

As I was the official caretaker and only driver of the Whoopy, as it was dubbed by my dad,it was my job to maintain it. I kept it clean and polished. I would even go out and wash it in February in the bitter cold if it needed washing. I kept it tuned up and repaired mechanically except for one thing. I didn't have a clue how to work on brakes. The first time it was up for inspection I proudly drove it up to Barbara's Texaco and got in line for the inspection. When I finally made it to the front of the line the brakes were smelling funny. Kind of a burnt smell. Oh well, go ahead and inspect this baby! The mechanic got in, fired it up, raced the engine a little then took off. When he came to the line where he needed to hit the brakes, the wheels screeched, the left front wheel completely froze up, and the car did a beautiful 180. Since the car was now facing me I was able to see what caused the metallic bounce, roll, bounce bounce, roll to a stop, and lie there sound the car emitted when it stopped. The headlight trim had come completely off the fender and rolled across the parking lot. 

The wait for an inspection back then was long. The later in the year it got, the longer the line got. I think the cutoff date for an inspection was April 15, but I might be thinking of something else important that day. Whatever the cutoff was, I was getting the Studebaker inspected one week before the deadline. I asked the mechanic if he would go ahead and pass it. I promised to get the brakes fixed. For some reason he didn't seem to believe me so I picked up my headlight rim and drove on home....slowly.

When my dad got home he asked how the inspection had gone. I told him every gory detail. He said, "Well, you better get those brakes fixed before the end of the week or you'll be walking." I said, "I don't know how to do a brake job!" He told me I better learn quick. He was a real cutup that way. He told me to go down to Kragen's Auto Parts, tell them the make and model of the car, and ask for new brakes for the front. "You probably don't need to do anything to the back brakes." He then told me to "jack up the car's front end, and pull off one wheel. Do not try to work on both wheels at the same time!" he warned. I thought this was odd since I couldn't even work on one wheel, much less two at the same time... so I asked why? He patiently told me "BECAUSE I SAID SO! THAT'S WHY." At this point my mother interjected, "Now Leroy, he doesn't know how to do this. Don't yell at him." Sweet lady my Mom. He did finally tell me the secret of a successful brake job. He said, "When you pull off the wheel you're going to see hooks and springs, and lots of other crap that all goes together a certain way. If you will take off one piece at a time and lay all the parts down in order you will know how they go back." If you still can't remember you can pull the wheel from the other side and see how it goes together." Now, that made sense and I knew I would never have to ask that specific dumb question again.

The next morning, I jacked the front end of the car up, blocked it all securely and took off that first wheel. Well, that's how it should have worked. Unfortunately, the wheel was stuck because the brake shoes were stuck to the drum. (Remember burnt smell mentioned above?). I pulled and I tugged and I beat the drum with a hammer for two hours. I was frustrated so I walked away from it and ate some lunch. When I went back out I told myself it was just a car. It didn't have a brain and it wasn't fighting me for control of that left front wheel. It was just stuck. I hit that drum as hard as I could with my hammer. Then I gave it another tug. I felt some movement so I pulled really hard one more time. The wheel came off!! So did the brake shoes, the springs, the hooks, all the stuff I was supposed to remember how to put back. After I found all those little parts I started trying to put it all back together. I did not have a clue!! I had a slight moment of panic before I remembered that other wheel! I went around and removed the tire and outer wheel. I tenderly and lovingly held the drum in my hands and prayed everything would stay in place when I pulled that drum off. It slid off with no resistance. Prayer is a powerful thing. I now had a perfect example of how it was all supposed to go back together. I won't bore you with all the details of a brake job done before disc brakes were invented. Just suffice to say it took about 4 hours to put that first brake back together. I did the next wheel in about 45 minutes start to finish. I had walked through brake hell and survived. 

I set the car back down on the ground and went in to change clothes. I was wearing brake dust from top to bottom and didn't want to stain my 13 year old upholstery. I then went back out, started up the Whoopy with pride that I was now an accomplished brake mechanic. I put the transmission in reverse and backed down the driveway to the street. When I was ready to stop and slip it into first I put my foot on the brake pad and rode it all the way to the floor. Instead of having bad brakes, I now had no brakes at all. I crept back up the driveway and parked it. I needed more help. It was hard to ask for but I had to. Daddy was pretty good about it though and promised to help me fix it on Saturday. It seems when you do a brake job, it's important to "bleed" the brakes. I did not know cars had blood but apparently so. After my dad showed (and helped) me bleed the brakes, the brake pad was solid. I was a happy guy. I drove back down to Barbara's to get it inspected. Two days working on the brakes and when I got to Barbara's the mechanic asked if I had done a brake job. I proudly said yes and he slapped a sticker on the windshield. He didn't even test it but he probably should have. The next few days the brakes didn't feel just right and on the next Saturday morning I pulled into the Foodway Grocery store where I worked. The store was at the top of a long hill. As I got close to where I wanted to park I touched the brakes. There was nothing there. I did not panic though. I scanned the parking lot for the oldest car I could see and ran into it. That stopped me. 

To this day that old Studebaker still gives us trouble with the brakes. My dad went all through the system and found nothing. Glenn has done the same several times with no results. The old car is sitting in one of his garages now because he can't find out where the brake fluid keeps going. Maybe I should pray over it.

Poor, Poor Pitiful Me

 It’s hotter than it used to be here in Hurst, Texas. When we were kids we would head outdoors right after breakfast was over and not come back in til the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches were ready at lunch time. Then, right back out until we were called in for dinner. Usually, we would go back out after dinner and stay out until we were called in for bed. Summertime in Hurst, Texas was more fun than a barrel of monkeys. 

One of my favorite memories of summer back then was to stay out after dark. We would lay out on the cool grass and look at the stars. You could see the stars back then. A highlight of any evening would be the occasional “shooting star”. Life was so good...so simple. 

Of course these memories are of a kid without any responsibilities. Our parents probably thought summers were long, hot, and miserable. We also had no clue what was going on in the rest of the world. No one told us about the festering problems in Vietnam. In fact, one of our neighbors who was several years older than the rest of us joined the Army...or I should say we thought he joined the Army. Turns out he was drafted into the Army. He came home after his induction and told us he was able to choose where he wanted to be sent. He said he looked at the list, found a country he had never heard of, thought it would be nice and quiet, and volunteered to go to a little country called Vietnam. Yes, we were that naive...and we liked it that way.

Nothing much happened back in those days. The highlight of any summer was to get so sunburned that your siblings and friends could sit and peel the dead skin off of your back. Oh sure, every once in a while something spectacular would happen. Like the time my sister Cindy tripped over an electric fence set up to keep piglets corralled . Poor girl fell face first in the slop. I only got spanked for that (it was my fault) and not killed. Sometimes I think back and wonder if the spanking wasn’t for the uncontrolled laughter I couldn’t choke back rather than the actual “accident”. 

Another exciting time was when Glenn and I were out playing after dark. There was a full moon that night when my sister (same sister, Cindy) climbed up on a brick wall between our front and back yard. Oh yeah, she happened to be wearing a white sheet over her head at the time. The sheet she was wearing got stuck on something and caused her to fall forward.. As she fell the sheet waved softly in the breeze as she screamed bloody murder. This got our attention and when we saw a screaming ghost flying over the brick wall we joined in the screaming and ran about two miles down the street. We would have run further but we lived on a cul-de-sac and got tired of running around and around in circles.

I guess I’m just getting old but summer isn’t fun anymore. During the spring I start looking forward to fall. During the winter I start dreading spring. Yes, I know I complain about this every year at about this time. Life isn’t fun in Texas in August. I really feel sorry for the transplants moving in from California and New York. They all probably decided to move to Texas in the winter when they were amazed they could walk around without a coat. Ha Ha, fooled them. I don’t allow them to complain to me about the heat. I didn’t invite any of them to move down here. Had I been thinking when this migration started I would have tried to work a deal to trade what they left behind for what I would like to leave behind. Sadly, I am married to Debbie. Not that I don’t want to be married to Debbie. I love being married to Debbie but she has mental problems. She loves Texas and she especially loves Hurst, Texas. She thinks there’s no better place to be. Since we compromise all conflicting opinions, we will continue to sit here in Hurst, Texas, sweating and complaining about the heat. Poor, poor, pitiful me.

News Flash

 I spent the morning writing a really exciting and thought-provoking story. It involved traveling, sweating, and frugality. I was determined to publish a story today. As I always do, I wrote my story on a blank document to transfer to my blog page....no brainer. I have spent the last half hour trying to transfer this cotton-picking, ornery, stupid file onto my page. I have failed and I give up. I'm too irritated to start over today but I promised myself I would publish something......sadly, this is it...sorry. I hope to send something out tomorrow. 

Little Kirsti

 Little Kirsti never liked being called “Little” because she was just the same as the other kids in her first grade class. She got the name when she was first born and had no say over what she would be called. It didn’t seem fair but evidently it happens to everyone.

Little Kirsti was born a whole month before she was supposed to. Her mommy developed extremely high blood pressure eight months into the pregnancy and the doctors decided Little Kirsti needed to be born….right now!! She was a tiny little thing and her lungs hadn’t fully developed. She spent nearly a month in NICU before she was allowed to go home. During that month she scared her family several times by trying to die. She was just too little to be in the world and it was touch and go whether she would ever grow up.

As time passed and Little Kirsti grew she lost the feebleness of premature birth but she didn’t outgrow the name. It seemed Little Kirsti was going to be “Little” her whole life. She hated that fact. How could she let people know she was a grown up Kirsti and not “Little”.  After all, she was six years old and going to school with her big brother. No one called him Little Frank. He was just Frank, or as mommy said, Frankie. She was glad she had dodged the bullet of old fashioned names like Frank’s but she needed to lose the “Little” moniker. (Editor’s note: Little Kirsti didn’t know what moniker meant. She just knew “Little” was a stupid name.) 

Little Kirsti would lay awake at night to think of ways to lose that name. She thought if she ate a lot and got fat no one would call her little, but she worried what her friends might then start to call her. Besides, Little Kirsti did not like to eat anything normal or healthy. She preferred to live on potato chips, cookies, and marshmallows. She also tried to always miss the family gatherings around the dinner table. There were rules at the dinner table. These rules were called manners and she had no use for manners. Little Kirsti lived on snacks consumed in front of the television watching the Elmo show. She loved Elmo.

Little Kirsti’s family had developed the habit of being easy on her since she was so tiny and helpless at birth. It didn’t take long for her to figure out she had it made. No one really expected anything out of her. She didn’t have to clean her room very often and when she did no one really expected the room to be clean. She didn’t help with housework and didn’t help her daddy work in the yard. She began to lose respect for her mommy and daddy because of the way she was allowed to get away with everything. They would always be surprised when her grandparents would bring her home after a sleepover commenting on how sweet she had been. She sure wasn’t very sweet at home. Her favorite word was “NO” whenever she was asked or told to do something. She felt she had to show how grownup and independent she was in order to lose the hated name. She also began to make orneriness her standard personality but the name Little Kirsti didn’t go away.

One cold winter night the wind was blowing against Little Kirsti’s bedroom window. The sound 

Kept her awake and a bit nervous. The wind had a mournful sound to it and gave her the chills. She huddled up under her blankets and wished the wind would stop. As she wished for a peaceful night, all of a sudden the window blew open and a cold winter wind came blasting into the room. Little Kirsti knew she had to get out of her safe and warm bed to close that window but she waited as long as she could. Finally, the cold seeped through the covers on her bed and she had no choice. She jumped out of bed, ran to the window, and slammed it shut. If Little Kirsti had been thinking like the big girl she thought herself to be she would have wondered how a window sliding up and down could be blown open by the wind. This thought never had time to register though because as she turned away from the window she saw what appeared to be a fairy princess standing next to her bed. She couldn’t believe it. She thought fairy princesses were just imagination!

Little Kirsti was afraid and wanted to run to her daddy’s bedroom but she couldn’t get her feet to move. She was frozen in place while looking into the eyes of this beautiful fairy. The eyes were brilliant blue and very loving. Little Kirsti didn’t know how eyes could be loving and friendly but they were. She was hypnotized by those beautiful blue eyes. 

Suddenly, the beautiful fairy began to speak. She told Little Kirsti to get back in her bed because she had something special to tell her. She then asked Little Kirsti what her biggest wish might be. Little Kirst immediately answered that she wished everyone would just call her Kirsti, not Little Kirsti. The beautiful fairy smiled then and asked Little Kirsti why she was referred to as “Little”? Little Kirsti then told her about her mommy’s difficult pregnancy and how she had to deliver her baby way too early. The baby was so small and frail she became known as “Little” Kirsti. The name stuck and here she was nearly full grown, almost seven, and still being called “Little”. She did not like the name one bit! The fairy then asked her how her parents should know she wasn’t still little. She replied, “Well, look at me! I’m the very same size as all my friends and no one calls them little!” The beautiful fairy smiled again and said, “Little Kirsti, I’m going to tell you now what I was sent to tell you. Listen carefully:”

“ A person isn’t judged by how they look. They are judged by how they act. So far, your tiny  body has grown bigger and strong. You aren’t the frail little baby you were when you received your name….but, you are evidently still the helpless little baby you were. Your body has grown but your actions, your personality, hasn’t grown at all. How do you talk to your parents? Are you respectful to them as you are to your grandparents? Do you help your mommy and daddy around the house and assume some jobs as your own chores? Do you try to do things right when you work? Is your bedroom clean and neat? Can you dress yourself properly and keep your face, hands, and clothes clean enough to not show everyone what you just ate? Can you answer all these questions for me Little Kirsti?” Little Kirsti sat and scowled at the fairy princess. She finally answered with an angry voice, “I don’t know!” The fairy smiled once more and said, “You do know the answer Little Kirsti. It’s the same answer you give to your parents when they tell you to sit at the table and eat your food or to get ready for bed. Your answer to these instructions is always, “NO!” It’s time for you to grow now. I’m going away but I will be watching. I hope you will remember that your actions tell people how grown up you are...or aren’t!”

The fairy princess slowly vanished and the wind outside stopped blowing. Little Kirsti woke up  and it was morning. She sadly realized her visit with a beautiful fairy princess had been nothing more than a dream. She also thought it might be a good idea to try some of the things she had been told in the dream. She went downstairs and softly said “good morning” to her mommy and daddy. She slipped into a chair at the table and ate the breakfast that had been prepared. She hated it but she ate it and even thanked her parents for breakfast! She put away her dishes and cleaned the table where she had eaten. She then went upstairs and looked in her closet for clothes that were not only comfortable but color coordinated. She dressed properly for the first time ever without trying to look sloppy. She did all the things a grownup six and nearly seven year old ought to be able to do without help. She continued doing these things, and more, for many, many days. Then one day something wonderful happened. Her daddy had a group of men coming to their house for a meeting. As each of them arrived, he introduced his wife, his son Frank, and his daughter Kirsti. No more Little Kirsti….she finally grew up.

Ah, Spring...

Spring....when a young man's heart turns to love and an old man's heart turns to finding a good lawn boy. I shouldn't say "lawn boy" now because there are very few "lawn boys" out there. Professional lawn care services rule the market now. I haven't seen a teenager mow a lawn in several years (with apologies to grandsons Andy and Sam who work their respective hineys off during the summer). I keep waiting for them to say, "Hey Papa, let us take care of that yard for you this year" but so far I haven't heard anything.

I have been out looking over the yard and now I'm depressed and overwhelmed. During our long cold spell this winter we lost over half of our shrubs, most of the lawn, and one huge live oak. Despite Debbie's promise that she wasn't going to work flower beds anymore (she made this claim last August), she spent yesterday afternoon buying up about a quarter of Calloway Nursery's inventory. I went to Calloway's with her and spent the time reminding her that we were through with yard work. All the while she was loading up the two-tiered cart I was pushing around. By the time the damage was done and I was loading it all into the back of my pickup, I knew the stage was set for another miserable summer in Texas. As the sun began to set in the west and the truck was unloaded, she announced that tomorrow, now today, would be spent digging up dead shrubbery and planting new. Its a never-ending cycle that always begins in the early spring and lasts until the temperature reaches into the high nineties.

Last year we talked about selling our home and buying a townhouse. We found a realtor we liked and started the process. As the days passed we realized that even though the value of our house had sky-rocketed with a promise it would be sold in less than a week, we couldn't find any other area we liked as well as where we had spent the last twenty-five years. We gave up the idea of moving and vowed to each other (yes, vowed, not suggested, not considered....we vowed doggone it) we would do no more yard work. We would find a good lawn care service to take care of it all. Every time I reminded Debbie of our vow yesterday she replied, "Well you don't want to hire someone just to dig up shrubbery and replant do you?" Well, yes! I do want to hire someone to do that. I'm too old and out of shape for that nonsense. She just poo-pooed me and kept on loading up green stuff.

I'm waiting for her to finish her coffee now so we can get after it. It's entirely possible I won't survive the day. The last time I tried to work in the yard I stumbled and fell...broke three ribs. AND, when I did this Debbie said, "Well, this settles it! No more yard work for you!" What has changed in the last four weeks. It's a conundrum...

And to Andy and/or Sam, if you are reading this I will pay you DOUBLE what my grandpa used to pay me for mowing his lawn. It was a quarter...and my dad always made me give the quarter back.