Tractors and Yard Work

          Spring has sprung along with all the weeds that I euphemistically refer to as grass. It is time to mow. I know, it sounds like work, but it is not all bad.

            There was a time when I hated yard work. It was a huge bone of contention between my father and me. It was even bigger than cars and all the trouble I caused with them. As soon as he said, “The yard needs mowing,” the fight was on. I never won, but I made sure that the process was not pleasant for him. I was an awful child. I still don’t like mowing. It brings back all those very loud memories, but there is a difference now that makes me look forward to mowing.

            “I like tractors purdy good,” is a line from a movie that the oldest Princess quotes with a heavy drawl, and that is the essence of my feelings.  "I like tractors purdy good too."

            Over the next three days, I’ll be mowing the property for the first time this year, and although dirty work, it makes me happy. I do not miss mowing over the winter, but I do miss riding the tractor. The tractor is a nice little diesel powered one with a three-point lift and a pull behind, three-blade finish mower.  It is my man toy, one of many, but by far, my favorite.

            During the not mowing months, I find reasons to employ it in other activities. I drive it around the acreage to check for fallen trees, to make sure the fences are up, holding the nonexistent livestock, and to poison fire-ant beds. These are all legitimate activities that can be done in the truck, but with not as much fun as with the tractor. The Admiral tolerates this, pretending, as I do, that I am actually working, but she can't hide her amusement when I fire up my little darlin' and drive it down to check the mail. Mowing is its reason for living, and now, it is time, and I am a happy man.

            I cut a forty-eight inch swath with every pass, run over fire-ant beds with impunity, and mulch leaves as I go. The tractor maneuvers so well that I can dodge in and out of the myriad trees as if I were in a sports car. Shoot, I’ve even dodged spider webs on the thing although the roll bar tends to catch them on occasions and deposit them on my back, or worse, down my neck.

            I like the roll bar. This isn’t my first tractor, but the first so equipped. I have not needed it yet, but I’ve driven tractors before where I did. I have rolled one, driven one off a sea wall, and even gotten the frontend of one suspended off the ground driving through a swing set. I have the pictures to prove it.

            I love riding the tractor for another reason, the alone time. When I’m driving with the engine at 2200 rpm, and the mower blades roaring, I have my ear plugs in, my hat pulled low, and my brain on minimum function. I am in my own little world. There are no distractions. Even though I carry my cell phone, I can’t hear it ring. I get into a zone and my mind is free to wander, and it goes places hard to imagine when not on the tractor. It is the ultimate daydream machine. I am semi-conscious, sensory deprived, and I can go anywhere and do anything.

            I am caught in one of life’s unexpected ironies. I do not like mowing the grass, but that is when I can drive my tractor the most. I mean, you can't spend an hour going down to check the mail. I guess I can buy some more implements for it. It will be a hard sell though. I will have to convince the Admiral that we have to have a drag bar, or a front-end loader, or a back-hoe, and that life will be a lot better with them. I will have to sell her on the idea that the yard needs leveling, dirt needs moving, and maybe I can get her with the suggestion of digging a hole for a swimming pool. I have to have the rationale. I do not think, “I like tractors purdy good,” will cut it. There is profound truth in those words, but truth will not buy man-toys. 

April, It's Fools, It’s Baseball; It’s America

          April 1st has two meanings in our family. For the Admiral, it is April Fools' Day, and she lives up to the suggested behavior. She loves practical jokes, so the day is for her. She has gotten me so many times over the years that I have begun to dread the day, but this year, I got her.

            Our day starts early by most standards, but when the alarm went off on April 1 at the customary time, I shouted, "Oh, my gosh, it's 7:30!" Meaning, all who have to be somewhere, are horribly late. It was a good laugh, but I sat on pins and needles all day dreading her certain revenge. Not even that level of anxiety can dampen my mood and joy for the true meaning of the day. April 1st is the holy day-of-days, the Opening Day of baseball season.

            I love this time of year. The whole of America is innocent with new beginning. We’re born again. It is trite to quote John Fogerty’s “Centerfield”, but there really is “new grass on the field”. Another season of baseball has begun, and with it, America’s heart beats.

            Baseball is America’s game. It is a microcosm of the American experience. Just like our country, baseball is a game of individuals. Nine come together for a common cause, to win. These nine people are as diverse in character, stature, ability, and motivation as is the populace of our nation, but they, like our nation, ban together to contest for victory. No one person is greater than the whole. There may be stars on a baseball team but it is the utility player, the player who has a role, the unsung who labors in the shadows, it is he who makes the team and our nation winners. It is the common guy who is willing to sacrifice for the good of the team, for the good of us all.

            Again, like life in America, if you fail today, baseball allows you to get up and swing for the fence tomorrow. It almost insists that you do. Take the opportunity. Try again, fail again, but keep at it and you will succeed.

            Ted Williams is the last player to hit over .400. He hit .406 in 1941, a remarkable achievement.  If you break it down, that average means that for every ten times Ted Williams went to the plate to hit, he failed six of them. The National League batting champion for 2012, Buster Posey of the San Francisco Giants, hit .336.  That means that he failed 66.4% of the time. Our country is the same way. We may stumble and fall, but in the end, we will be winners if we keep swinging. We do not quit even if we are knocked down six times. We will get up and win the next four, and the game.

            As in America, there is symmetry in baseball. Our country is all about being square, and just. There are ninety feet between the bases. If there were ninety-one, no one would ever be safe, and if there were eighty-nine feet, no one would ever be out. That is not American. In America, we all have a chance to succeed equally. The American way of life is based on our dedication, skill, willingness to improve, level of sacrifice, and our never quit attitude, just like baseball.

            Baseball is the only game where the offense faces the entire defense of the other team one person at a time, just like Americans, we are never afraid of the odds. “It will take all nine of you to beat me. Bring me your best.” That is the American spirit. It is what makes us unconquerable. You cannot beat one of us much less nine of us. The only way America can be defeated, like a baseball team is from within.

            Dissension and complacency will bring us down. We all have to do our part or the team fails. No one is asked to do it all, but we are all asked to do some. With new grass on the field, we have an opportunity to revel in what makes us great, each other. Let us not let each other down, and as for the jokes made at our expense, let us revel in the fact that someone cares enough, and is secure enough to joke with us.

VWs In My Life

          I do not buy my children cars, not new ones anyway. If they want a car of their own, they have to buy it themselves, or agree to my plan, which is, I will buy them a car for no more than $1,500, it stays in my name for insurance purposes, and when they turn 18, and graduate from high school, it will be theirs. You don't get much car for $1,500. They are projects, and that is part of the deal.

            We, the child and me, work on it together with me providing the expertise and money, while they provide the labor. The minimum they have to do with the vehicle is make it run well, and be safe. Cosmetics are optional, but it has to be functional. The plan has turned out to be very beneficial for both parties.

            Not all eight of my children have taken me up on the offer. Two of the three boys entered into the contract and did no more than the minimum. They did not care if the floorboard was rotting out, or the fenders rusted through. As long as there was enough duct tape to hold it together, they were happy. One of the girls took the agreement as far as it would go. Over two years, she produced a beautifully restored 1974 Mercedes 280 SEL, which she drove away to college.

            For those who take me up on the offer, the benefits are many. They learn how an automobile works, how much it costs, and how hard it is to fix when it breaks. They take care of them, and never let anyone outside the family drive their cars, which is a safety issue in itself. It is a wonderful bonding time between the child and me. Now, it is the Princesses' turn.

            The older, driving one has chosen a VW Bug. After a year of looking, we found the right one, a 1972 Super Beetle. It is painted flat black and has been in the hands of idiots, so needs a lot of work. She wants the job done right and is patient, which is good, because this is going to take awhile. Research of the VIN has revealed its original color to be Texas Yellow; hence, the car is named Rose, as in The Yellow Rose of Texas. The Princess and Rose are girls after my own heart. I did not think it would affect me so, but when I opened the door to the car, the VW distinctive smell hit my heart like a freight train as memories flooded me.

            A Volkswagen was not my first car. I had a '52 Plymouth, a '57 Oldsmobile, and a Chevy Nova before I became part owner of a '62 VW Bus along with three other guys in my high school graduating class. Our plan was to drive it from Fort Worth to Cape Horn at the tip of South America. Because I was always tinkering with hotrods, I became the default mechanic. I embarked with a toolbox containing ten wrenches, a like number of sockets, a couple of screwdrivers, a hammer, pliers, and an adjustable wrench, most of which I still have. We made it almost to South America before we ran our money down to just enough to buy gas to get home, but my life's path with VWs was set.

            I wish I had time and space to list all the Volkswagens I have owned, and all the adventures I have had in them. That will be a good book project. It will be interesting to add up all the miles I have logged, the beaches, mountains, deserts, plains, and interstates I have traversed. The one great memory and tradition I will always treasure will be that all six children of the first litter came home from the hospital in VWs. For the last child, when our business was booming, and we had many luxury cars at our disposal, we chose a Sirocco, a sporty VW Rabbit that I was tricking out in the shop, to bring him home. Neither the Admiral nor I remember what car we brought the Princesses home in, but tradition dictates that it must have been a Volkswagen.

            Because of the simplicity of The People's Car, the ease of obtaining parts and their low cost, I worked on a lot of them through college. When I had all the education I wanted, and was making a career choice, I was making more money working on VWs than I ever would with a degree in biology. I went to a dealership, convinced them that I knew what I was doing, was hired as a mechanic, and the rest is history, but history always has another chapter, and we will write it. The Princess and I have a Beetle.

            I am excited to be working on a VW again, but I fear this path is coming to a serious fork. When the car is finished, will I be willing to relinquish it to the Princess? It will be a hard thing, but I am certain I will, but what about me? I see another Bug on the horizon, and another, and a Bus, and the beat goes on. They are part of who I am, how I got here, and now, where I am going. I think that when I pass, I will have the family get into a VW Bus and drive the highways scattering my ashes as they go. That just seems to fit me. 

The Prom Princesses

          I love girls. It is a good thing since I have five daughters, and a wife, not to mention the dog and frog, but sometimes it almost more than I can bear. Now is one of those times, it is prom time. God, give me strength.

            This is not my first rodeo with proms. I have been through many, even to the point of borrowing a friend's Rolls Royce and chauffeuring the girls and their dates to dances, but this one is different. It is the first prom for both the Princesses, and they are going to the same one, but to make this unique, they are not only going to the same one, but with the same boy, at the same time. It brings new meaning to the term "double date".

            After first glance, it is not as strange as it may seem, at least, not to me. The Princesses are very close, closer than any two siblings I have ever known, even twins. They say they should have been twins. They have the same likes, do many of the same things, and are truly BFFEs. That's "Best Friends For Ever" to those of you uninitiated into the lexicon of texting. They are very different in temperament, and to me, in looks, are joined at the hip in many ways, but going out with the same boy, at the same time, to the same dance? I don't know about this.

            The young man doing the asking is one they box with at the gym. He is a very nice boy, with some skill, excellent manners, and is okay looking. The Princesses say he is hot, but what do they know? Anyway, he came up to me at one of our sparring sessions, and asked me, calling me Mister Atwood, something I will never be comfortable with, "Do you mind if I ask your daughters to prom?"

            I wasn't certain I had heard him use the plural, but gave my blessing. I was still surprised when he went to each Princess, asking her out. They were thrilled, while I and the other boxers were delighted.

            I ask him later, "Why both?"

            His reply, "They're a set, aren't they?"

            On the way home, the Princesses could not shut-up about this young man, how thrilled they were that a senior, with his own car, had invited both of them to prom. I shuddered, and swallowed hard, but was smiling all the while. The Princesses are growing up.

            To the next boxing session, I had the Princesses wear their custom made shirts that have a set of boxing gloves on the front surrounded by the words, "Touch me, and the first lesson is free." I faintly hoped he might be discouraged, but the opposite was true. He was delighted and told me he was up to the challenge. I do hope he knows what the challenge is, and where it will come from.

            On the way home from that class, the talk took the turn I dreaded, dresses. I had almost forgotten about that subject much in the same way a patient in a bad accident or injury blocks out the memory for survival, but it came crashing back to my conscious mind. I was going to have to buy two dresses!

            The expense of two dresses is enough to make me go into shock, but when the talk turned to the fact that they had to match, but not be the same, I knew the Admiral and I were in for a long haul. As I write this, four days before the event, there are five dresses, one, the Admiral's prom dress, hanging in various places around the house, none of which exactly fit either of the Princesses. The Admiral has her work cut out for her. I want to go and hide in the shop until it is time to take pictures. Where is the Fairy Godmother when you need her?

             This week is supposed to be spring break, a week of fun, going places, and relaxing, but has turned into the high-intensity time of shopping for shoes and accessories, which cannot be done until dresses are decided upon and fitted. At the current rate, that may not be until the day of the prom, which further adds to the tension and stress.

            I have retreated deeper into the shop, somewhere behind the tractor humming to myself, making engine noises, trying to drown out the cries of, "This will never fit," or, "These shoes don't match this bag," and don't forget, "My hair looks awful!"

            It will all come together minutes after the young man is here to pick up his dates, giving me my opportunity to participate in the time honored ritual of terrorizing him as I casually finish cleaning my shotgun by working the action as he comes in the front door. Pictures will be taken, many laughs will be had, smiles shared, and the Admiral and I will shed a few tears as our young women walk away to get into a car with this intrepid young man.

            Don't you think the Princesses will be lovely with their formal dresses covered by their "Touch me, and the first lesson is free" T-shirts? Won't they be charmed by the sound of my maniacal laughter after I declare, "I don't mind going back to prison," as they walk away? It will be a night to remember.

Eat it, Don't Leave it

         I eat a lot and have a lot to eat, but it has not always been that way. My experience with doing with and without came while I was in the Marine Corps.

            My first meal in boot camp was breakfast and memorable for many reasons. One was a sign hanging behind the chow line that read, "Take all you want, eat all you take." I soon found out that they were serious about that.

            At that breakfast, I was so scared with Drill Instructors yelling, the noise, no sleep, sloppy clothes, my baldhead, that I kept my eyes straight ahead as instructed, and put my tray out whenever I wanted something. For some inexplicable reason, I thought you had to take everything. I ended up with a queasy stomach, and a tray heaped with food. As I approached the table, I saw that my fellow recruits, thinking more clearly than me, had a cracker, or a piece of toast, or nothing, but none had the arm straining weight of the food I carried.  

            When I sat, I saw our Drill Instructor glaring at me. I put the slogan I had seen together with that look and my tray that should have had a forklift under it instead of my quivering arms, and I knew I was in for a life altering experience.

            I watched in terror as the huge man stormed over to me. I was able to jump to the position of attention as he put his face an inch from mine and screamed the profanities of a demon. I was able to decipher that he ordered me to eat every bite of food on my plates, notice the plural. Further, I had three minutes to do it, and if I were unable to hold it down, I would have the opportunity to eat it again. I believed him. I looked at my tray and the horror of my error came crashing home. I thought to myself, "I am going to die in the Marine Corps, not in combat, but from breakfast."

            I sat to my task with both hands scooping food into my mouth. I chewed very little of it, and was getting through it pretty well until I saw the bowl of oatmeal. I have never liked oatmeal. The thought makes me sick, and there sat a bowl of the stuff, steaming, as if to mock me. I broke into a sweat that soaked my shirt.

            There was only one way I was going to be able to put that stuff on top of everything else and not see it again. I scooped the whole glob out of the bowl with my right hand. My gag reflex was working overtime as I brought the mess to my mouth. Before I got it there, a recruit sitting down the table from me, hurled his miniscule breakfast and everything he had eaten in the past month. Mine was on the way up to join his, but I believed the Drill Instructor's stated consequence. I crammed all the oatmeal into my mouth at once and swallowed to hold the coming eruption down. I closed my eyes and tears joined the sweat coursing down my face, but I did it. I got it all down, and held it. I won. I had survived breakfast.

            The next event with food was the opposite. In Vietnam, due to some real life and death circumstances, my unit was without food and water for three days and four nights, and under extreme physical duress. I dreamed of that boot camp breakfast and longed for the morsel of oatmeal that had slid down my face, onto my tray, that I hid by sliding a plate over it. These two experiences have combined to give me a near neurotic intolerance for wasting food.

            The real magnitude of my neurosis surfaced when I was a Scout Master. I had never been a waster, and it irked me when people would throw away untouched food in lunch lines, but with boys burning food just because they could, I became a Food Cop. Whatever you cooked, or took off the community plate, you ate. It became a hard and fast rule for my family, the scout troop, and me.

            Enter plastic storage containers. They are where food goes to die. This has become a point of contention between the Admiral and I. Being an Admiral, she thinks that every meal must feed a ships' company. Consequently, we have leftovers, and I don't mean a serving or two, I mean pans of stuff. After the meal, this food becomes an unrecognizable mass as it is squeezed into plastic containers and placed in the refrigerator.

            Someone will go there to investigate the leftovers, take out one of twenty plastic containers, open it, and not be able to discern what it is. They will sniff it in a vain attempt to identify the contents, and not being sure, or worse, knowing what the mass is, will return it to the fridge shelf where it will be shuttled into the dark recesses and left to become an unrecognizable mass with fur.

            When the refrigerator is cleaned, these tubs are emptied in a process that the Admiral euphemistically refers to as recycling. Knowing what you know about my aversion to waste, you can see how this process is ripe for conflict.

            We are working through it, cooking smaller portions, emphasizing the take-all-you-want-eat-all-you-take standard. It seems to be working. Either that or the Admiral is cleaning the fridge under the cover of darkness. The problem has a simple solution; eat it, don't leave it.

Shopping and Other Evils

     I believe that we conjure our own personal hell. Mine will be similar to Dante's ninth ring described in his "Inferno". It will be cold, and added to that, no sleep due to constant snoring although it is unclear where the snoring comes from if no one is asleep. Maybe it is piped in like elevator music. Added to these miseries, I will be required to go shopping…with women…for eternity. That thought alone has caused much repentance on my part.

            I stop mere micro-millimeters from saying that I hate shopping, but if it is possible to get any closer and not actually hate something, I am there. I squirm in my chair as I vividly remember shopping for school clothes on a miserably hot west Texas day in August in an un-air-conditioned department store. I can still feel the stiff scratchiness of new blue jeans on my bare, sweaty legs, as I was forced to try on pair after pair for what seemed like an eternity. Right back to the hell thing, aren't we?

            The most memorable whipping I received as a child, and there were many of them, all justified, was due to my throwing a screaming-meany fit because I did not want to go shopping with the family on a Saturday. The hell of this one was that I still had to go shopping, but with my butt stinging all the while. The only thing missing that day was the cold and snoring. Those two torments were years in the future.

            I have never liked shopping unless we were going for something I wanted, but that was so rare that I remember only once in my childhood it ever happening. That singular event was when I had somehow acquired sufficient funds to buy a pair of Converse All-stars. The shopping lasted ten minutes tops, as I already knew exactly what I wanted down to the size. It would have lasted five minutes, but my mother had to look over my purchase and compare one black high top to another to make sure I knew what I was doing.  Other than doubling the length of time in the store, it was near perfect. The only way you can improve on a five-minute shopping spree is if you do not leave the house at all. Enter, the modern age.

            I wondered if there was anything I couldn't buy over the internet and never have to leave my desk, much less the house. I started investigating, looking for obscure, ridicules things like a DC-3, a "Long-Tom" cannon, and a helicopter gun ship. I found them all for sale! I have not completed those purchases…yet.

            Shopping for these items has taken me into the darkest recesses of the Ether, or the cloud, as they now call it, and it is scary in there, but whatever your little heart desires, you can find. My stroll down that virtual dark alley, has given the term "Black Market" a completely new meaning.  

            After playing with the ridiculous, I wondered about the acquisition of more mundane, daily need items. I was not disappointed. The first thing I sought was groceries. I thought there would be no way, but I was stunned to find several online grocery providers who would ship right to my door. The real test came when I searched for the most staple of staples in my diet, chocolate doughnuts. Yep, I found them, right down to my favorite brand.

            The only problem I have with online shopping is that the prices are higher, and when you add shipping, it is cheaper to shop near home. I am willing to pay more for convenience, and to be able to stay home and not go into a store…with a female. The overage is a small price indeed.

            The Admiral is famous for saying, "I'm going to the store for a minute." I should know by now that she is not talking in "guy" minutes, which are the traditional sixty-second ones. No, she is speaking in "girl" minutes, which are sixty minutes long. Most normal people, or I should say, males, call that an hour.

            When she and the Princesses, trained by her, get home, I incredulously ask, "Where have you been?"

            They look at me with well-practiced, impatient stares and say, "At the store," as if that is the end all of explanations. They smile, and it goes downhill from there.

            You would think after all these years of marriage that I would have learned not to go to any store with her, but I have not. I am still a sucker for, "I'm only going for two things. Do you want to come along?" I love her, and do go, but it never fails. The "two things" turn out to be two shopping carts that are filled only after she has read, nay, memorized every label on every item.

            I know it is my fault. I bring it on myself as punishment for some sin for which I have not repented. After all, it is my own personal hell. Cue the cold and snoring.

I Just Can't Imagine

I recently watched the movie, "The Magic of Belle Isle" in which Morgan Freeman's character, Monte, declares, "Imagination.. the most powerful force ever made available to humankind." The line resonated with me, because it came on the heels of another encounter dealing with the same subject.

            A few days before, I had a conversation with a psychologist, which touched on the subject of today's youth and their imagination, or lack of it. I became a listener rather than a contributor as she is in a position to read studies and articles that I am not. The conversation got me to thinking. Are the youth of today lacking in imagination?

            She is a few years younger than I am, but close enough to make us contemporaries growing up. Our generation had only three television channels, there were no computers, and the only gaming devices we had were what we made, dug, or built. We played and worked in something called the outdoors. It was our world, and what a vast, wonderful world it was. It was a place where a home construction site became anything we wanted it to be, a palace, a haunted house, a cave, or a fort that had to be taken by force. Often, the scene would change in mid-game, and we would never miss a beat. Scrap lumber and a few straightened nails banged together with a rock provided us with swords, guns, and dollhouses. With the same scrap, we built tree houses that expanded until we reached branchs that would not hold us, someone would fall, and that would be our limit, but we dreamed of going farther, and often did.

           Yes, we got hurt. We broke bones, got bloody noses (you cannot attack a fort without some loss), stepped on nails, scraped elbows and knees, never stopping to clean or bandage them. That would come later. The amazing thing, in light of today's standards, is that we survived. The wounds recieved in conquering monsters in caves, or rescuing a princess from a tower, or slaying an evil empire in an afternoon, were worn as badges of honor saying, "I gave more than you did."

            Should the weather limit our being out in it, and it had to be a storm of biblical proportions to keep us in the house, there were always books to carry us far away. Yes, we read, and to each other as we shared the adventures living in our heads. In other words, we made stuff up. Whether indoors or out, it did not matter, we made stuff up. We used our imaginations. It was what we had.

            Our type of play required that we conjure up places, and things. We built castles in the sky, traveled around the world, fought a war, played in the world series, were football heroes, married as princes and princesses, had elegant teas with queens and kings, all before daddy got home from work and it was time for supper, and we never left our rooms. If we weren't good at making up adventures, or places to go, we could always tag along on someone elses magic carpet, but even the slowest of us could tell a story and off we would go, all contributing to it as it grew strangely and beautifully from the many minds that stirred the pot with imagination.

            Today's youth never leave their rooms either, but for different reasons.  They don't have to, or want to. Like us, everything they need is right there, but there is a big difference. Where our minds and imagination created our fantasies and stories, children today are given the story. With a game console, they can go and do the things we did, but all the facets of the game are provided and controlled for them, and their adventures are in 3D, and virtual reality. They don't have to imagine a thing.

            Computers are wonderful tools, but can be mind-numbing time suckers, taking children places, some, very dark. Children today are exposed to things I did not know until much later in life. They don't have to imagine, it is right there on a screen being played out in all its gruesome gore and reality.   

            Imagination is power. It is the power to create. Whether it is music, painting, writing, or inventing, before it became solid and real, it started as a thought. It was imagined. I was taught that if I can imagine it, I can do it. If it is in my head as a dream, it can become a reality.

            I do not share the foretold doom of my psychologist friend who showed me where the children's brains of today are not developing as ours did. I believe in the resilience of man. Those among present day children who have been encouraged to use their imagination will rise to the top, and though fewer in number, will lead humankind forward and upward, pushing the tree house to the edge of the branches, and imaging ways to overcome limitations. We will be led into different paths, and different ways, but creativity will continue, and the power of imagination will save us. I can't imagine it any other way… and that is a good thing.