It had been a rough day. Week? Month? Semester? Year? Whatever the unit of time measurement, it was a rough one. And while a Friday should have meant a break, the end of my workday was only the beginning of my actual work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The yard was a mess.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Back at my old house, I had a very small yard and a human-powered reel mower – and a small one at that – was enough to keep the grass under control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The new house has a much bigger yard and while I felt like an environmentally sound bad-ass, it was a lot of work. I bought a new-to-me reel mower from my neighbor across the street that had a wider wheel base and covered more ground with each pass, but it didn\u2019t do a great job at it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I read the manual, adjusted the blade, and now it didn\u2019t miss any grass.\u00a0 At all.\u00a0<\/em> And if the grass was tall and thick, it was no easy task to get through it.\u00a0 I tried to keep up with the lawn as spring set in so that I would have an easier time of it, but all the rain we had meant I couldn\u2019t get out there.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n And the grass kept growing.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n (Which sounds like something from horror fiction\u2026)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n So, on a hot and humid Friday afternoon, I hauled out the recently repaired reel mower and set to work. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I can usually make quick work of the yard – even with my human-powered self – but the thick grass and the now effective mower meant every pass pushed me to the limit.\u00a0 The grass was flying everywhere in huge clumps and the mower was constantly<\/em> bogged down.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n It didn\u2019t help that I was already tired or that it was around 80 degrees out. And that I didn\u2019t have water with me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I could get from the house to the street and back – and sometimes make two trips – but then I would need to stop and rest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Not just pause and keep on going. These rest periods were to leave the mower where-ever in the yard and go up to the house and sit on the bench. Or, more frequently, lay down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was taking me forever, but trying to power through the grass was really taking it out of me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The breaks became longer and it was my inherent tenacity and the threat of more rain that night that kept me going. But only just.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My next-door neighbors were out in their yard mowing their grass and playing with their kids.\u00a0 When I at last finished up I left the cursed mower in the driveway and staggered to the front porch steps.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n I saw down, panting and flushed and utterly wiped out.\u00a0 The front yard was done – but at what cost?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n After a few minutes I looked up to see my neighbor walk over, looking a little concerned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAre you okay?\u201d he asked and I replied \u201cI think so. Getting there, anyway,\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He joked that he didn\u2019t know CPR, but that his wife did. She was mowing their lawn, sensibly on a riding mower, and I joked back that I would wait until she was done. <\/p>\n\n\n\n We talked for a few minutes about the weather and the speed at which the grass had grown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When he was sure that I wasn\u2019t in danger, he started to head back to this house – noting that if it did pass out I should try and flop around so they would see me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I replied that I would make it, \u201cas dramatic as I could,\u201d and he was on his way. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I waited a few more minutes to make sure I wouldn\u2019t keel over, then got up and dragged the mower back to the garage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Inside the house, I woke up Jim from his nap and then went to take a cool shower and drink some water. <\/p>\n\n\n\n My face was still red for a while, but I recovered the rest of the way and slept well that night. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But, I hadn\u2019t done the backyard.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The promised storm didn\u2019t amount to much rain, but did knock down some branches. The day was cooler and I went out in the afternoon to clean those up. With more rain on the horizon, I decided to mow the backyard as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There are spots where the grass is taller and thicker than the front yard, but overall it\u2019s smaller and easier to mow. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I started with the trimmer to knock out at least some of the height and then got the mower going. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I was careful with myself this time and worked in smaller sections.\u00a0 When I got a little tired, I switched what I was doing and picked up more sticks – or dog poop, sigh – and did a little more trimming around the edge.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n I got it done, didn\u2019t pass out (or get close, really) and went inside for another cool shower. <\/p>\n\n\n\n And, I\u2019m happy with the result. The reel mower still isn\u2019t \u201cgreat\u201d, but it\u2019s quiet, safer, and doesn\u2019t take any fuel. As long as I\u2019m physically able to do it, I\u2019d still like to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Next time, I need to mow more frequently and bring water with me. Lesson learned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m still the bad-ass of my street – but I\u2019ve learned my limits.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It had been a rough day. Week? Month? Semester? Year? Whatever the unit of time measurement, it was a rough one. And while a Friday should have meant a break, the end of my workday was only the beginning of my actual work. The yard was a mess. Back at my old house, I had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_bluesky_dont_syndicate":"","_bluesky_syndication_accounts":"","_bluesky_syndication_text":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3229"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3235,"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3229\/revisions\/3235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thunderofwade.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n