A recent visit to Lake Wales to look in on my parents unexpectedly awakened nostalgia for yard work.
You never could have convinced the teenage version of me wiping the sweat from my eyes under an August Central Florida sun that I would ever miss being on the business end of a lawnmower. In those days, I dreaded the weekly or biweekly grass cutting, Spanish-moss-covered-tree-limb retrieving, weed whacking and raking that could drain me of five pounds of water weight in a single day.
It was drudgery, and in my mind, akin to torture.
Fast forward 37 years and sitting atop a zero-radius mower with 105 heat index produced a completely different sensation. After I learned how to cut a straight row, which took awhile, on this high-powered machine that would have made the chore so much easier in my younger days, I rather enjoyed it.
Like Forrest Gump endlessly puttering away on his Snapper at the local high school football stadium, I felt a sense of satisfaction few other tasks offer these days. Unlike most of the ways I occupy my time in mid-life, I could clearly see my progress and appreciate the result.
Truth is, it wasn’t the smell of sweat, gasoline and grass clippings that took me back. What really triggered the deja vu was the cold, lemon lime Gatorade splashing down the back of my throat. A few gulps and I was back in high school, stopping at the corner convenience store after football practice, guzzling a quart every afternoon.
I have mowed plenty of grass since then, but there was something about working in the yard I had helped tend with my brothers back in the late ‘80s that overwhelmed me with sentimentalism. I suddenly missed my brothers, and not because extra hands would have made lighter work. Sitting on that mower brought back the hours of video and board games, shooting hoops and throwing a football. All that was fun, but it was yardwork that cemented our bond and taught us the meaning and value of exertion.
With the benefit of hindsight I can see that I may have a slight tendency toward obsessive-compulsive disorder. The YouTube algorithm betrays my appreciation of those yard cleanup videos. I do like a pristine lawn and enjoy watching in fast speed someone whip an unruly landscape into shape.
My parents have a big yard – too big if you would have asked me in 1986. But on this trip, it felt just right. I had plenty of time to sort through my thoughts, separate the memories from the current day anxieties and puzzle over the inexplicable and unsolvable dilemmas long enough to feel I could let go of it all and just focus on keeping the row straight.
Sometimes there are challenges in life that beg for objective solutions. If I can just work hard enough, long enough and well enough, the results will look and feel good. Raising children into adulthood and looking after aging parents are decidedly not like yard work. There is no such thing as a straight row.
I’m grateful for the chance to mow my parents’ yard again. I’m glad they had better tools for the job and an endless supply of Gatorade. I’m even more appreciative of all they taught me by giving me that job in my formative years. I think it has served me well.
New South Essays 