Memorial Day Weekend
To my best friend, Pat...hope the knee replacement surgery goes well and that you aren't as big a baby as me!
I've always loved this weekend coming up. Memorial Day has always been symbolic of things starting anew and really sort of signals the start of decent weather in these parts. I'm hoping that the same holds true.
I've always associated Memorial Day with cleaning up the yard, planting the garden and hitting the ground running as summer arrives. So, I'm getting that feeling again.
And its impossible to think of the weekend and not recall wonderful Memorial Day celebrations on the big house on the hill. We grew up knowing that planting the garden was going to be an all-day event and sometimes a two day event. Everyone chipped in and worked hard, and following the dirt, the plants, the bitterness and the bitching there were ribs and chicken and beer and laughs, and laughs, and laughs.
I thought of all of this yesterday as I pulled weeds, cleaned up dead leaves, and mowed the lawn again because I didn't want to chance that it might rain for six more days before the mower could be moved.
It would appear that I did a lot of work by myself, but with the I-pod in my ear, my mind was really occupied with thoughts of my Dad and how he pushed me to always do a good job, whether it was pulling weeds or writing books.
"You can even up a lot of things in life by working hard," he told me on more than one bitter morning.
I'm making him sound like a bit of a philosopher...his true speech was much more colorful.
"Hey, you goofy bastard! You aren't gonna be worth shit unless you work harder than your working now," was more like it.
Dad had an insight. He pushed hard, and I really thank him for it.
I remember having to plant the cukes one year. He'd bought so many seeds that sprinkling the seeds down the line as he'd wanted me to do would've taken me about a year. I was only ten or eleven years old at the time...so I buried a lot of the seeds under the manure pile.
As luck might have it...they grew, and grew, and grew.
We had more cukes that year then ever before, and for years after we buried a lot of seeds under the manure pile.
Yet Dad always brought it up to me because he knew that I tried to cut a corner.
"Remember the time you buried the cukes," he'd say.
He said that to me last year.
In my mind he said that to me again yesterday.
Cutting corners usually doesn't work as well as it did that one time.
I worked hard yesterday and will do even more to get the yard where I need it to be.
It's about so much more than just doing yard work.
It's Memorial Day.
As I work this weekend it will be in memory of all of the soldiers, sure, but it will also get done in memory of all that we've lost as a family.
Just trying to make sure it isn't lost forever.
I've always loved this weekend coming up. Memorial Day has always been symbolic of things starting anew and really sort of signals the start of decent weather in these parts. I'm hoping that the same holds true.
I've always associated Memorial Day with cleaning up the yard, planting the garden and hitting the ground running as summer arrives. So, I'm getting that feeling again.
And its impossible to think of the weekend and not recall wonderful Memorial Day celebrations on the big house on the hill. We grew up knowing that planting the garden was going to be an all-day event and sometimes a two day event. Everyone chipped in and worked hard, and following the dirt, the plants, the bitterness and the bitching there were ribs and chicken and beer and laughs, and laughs, and laughs.
I thought of all of this yesterday as I pulled weeds, cleaned up dead leaves, and mowed the lawn again because I didn't want to chance that it might rain for six more days before the mower could be moved.
It would appear that I did a lot of work by myself, but with the I-pod in my ear, my mind was really occupied with thoughts of my Dad and how he pushed me to always do a good job, whether it was pulling weeds or writing books.
"You can even up a lot of things in life by working hard," he told me on more than one bitter morning.
I'm making him sound like a bit of a philosopher...his true speech was much more colorful.
"Hey, you goofy bastard! You aren't gonna be worth shit unless you work harder than your working now," was more like it.
Dad had an insight. He pushed hard, and I really thank him for it.
I remember having to plant the cukes one year. He'd bought so many seeds that sprinkling the seeds down the line as he'd wanted me to do would've taken me about a year. I was only ten or eleven years old at the time...so I buried a lot of the seeds under the manure pile.
As luck might have it...they grew, and grew, and grew.
We had more cukes that year then ever before, and for years after we buried a lot of seeds under the manure pile.
Yet Dad always brought it up to me because he knew that I tried to cut a corner.
"Remember the time you buried the cukes," he'd say.
He said that to me last year.
In my mind he said that to me again yesterday.
Cutting corners usually doesn't work as well as it did that one time.
I worked hard yesterday and will do even more to get the yard where I need it to be.
It's about so much more than just doing yard work.
It's Memorial Day.
As I work this weekend it will be in memory of all of the soldiers, sure, but it will also get done in memory of all that we've lost as a family.
Just trying to make sure it isn't lost forever.
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