Working with my ancestor
Posted: Fri Sep 25, 2020 1:19 pm
This was an unusually interesting experience.
I've honored ancestors and tried to be mindful of their lessons in the past, but never have I actually "worked" with my ancestor. I mean actual physical labor.
I hadn't mentioned that I've been at my mothers home for over a month now. She had a fall in late August and needed a great deal of help. So I came to do all the cooking and cleaning and help wherever needed. She is completely relying on a walker now.
She fell because of an old tuft of dead grass in a lawn that had been let go because of the drought. That lawn has been dead over 4 years now. We have talked about decorative rock, with maybe a dry creek bed "look" for as long as the lawn has been dead.
We discovered her walker will not do well in decorative rock so we decided on decomposed granite because the finished surface is almost as hard as cement.
I have spent several days in the last many weeks shoveling and scraping up the earth and removing the old tufts of grass.
So here is the weird part... when I pulled dads old shovel out of the shed and started working, it was as if the labor was easy. I realized the well worn and highly polished surface of the handle was the years of toil my Father had imbued upon this tool. The work was nearly effortless went fairly quickly and I did not get one blister nor did my damaged back give me much grief. I could feel my dad there with me in some sense holding me up encouraging me, as if he knew this is the best option to keep mom in her home for as long as possible.
Well, the DG was dumped in the driveway Wednesday, I laid the weed paper Thursday morning and Thursday afternoon I began to haul the gravel to the backyard. Unfortunatly dad's old wheelbarrow has a tire low on air and that did make it harder, but thankfully my gardener helper showed up early with a good wheelbarrow, put air in ours and we were in business. After about ten trips I was toast, it was at least 95 degrees and I could hear my dad saying, "sit down, this is why you hired this guy. "
What an amazing experience. I'm going up to the cemetery right now to bring flowers and thank Dad and leave apples and carrots for the deer.
They come to pound it out on Saturday. I'll post a picture later.
Thanks Dad ❤
Bb, Firebird
I've honored ancestors and tried to be mindful of their lessons in the past, but never have I actually "worked" with my ancestor. I mean actual physical labor.
I hadn't mentioned that I've been at my mothers home for over a month now. She had a fall in late August and needed a great deal of help. So I came to do all the cooking and cleaning and help wherever needed. She is completely relying on a walker now.
She fell because of an old tuft of dead grass in a lawn that had been let go because of the drought. That lawn has been dead over 4 years now. We have talked about decorative rock, with maybe a dry creek bed "look" for as long as the lawn has been dead.
We discovered her walker will not do well in decorative rock so we decided on decomposed granite because the finished surface is almost as hard as cement.
I have spent several days in the last many weeks shoveling and scraping up the earth and removing the old tufts of grass.
So here is the weird part... when I pulled dads old shovel out of the shed and started working, it was as if the labor was easy. I realized the well worn and highly polished surface of the handle was the years of toil my Father had imbued upon this tool. The work was nearly effortless went fairly quickly and I did not get one blister nor did my damaged back give me much grief. I could feel my dad there with me in some sense holding me up encouraging me, as if he knew this is the best option to keep mom in her home for as long as possible.
Well, the DG was dumped in the driveway Wednesday, I laid the weed paper Thursday morning and Thursday afternoon I began to haul the gravel to the backyard. Unfortunatly dad's old wheelbarrow has a tire low on air and that did make it harder, but thankfully my gardener helper showed up early with a good wheelbarrow, put air in ours and we were in business. After about ten trips I was toast, it was at least 95 degrees and I could hear my dad saying, "sit down, this is why you hired this guy. "
What an amazing experience. I'm going up to the cemetery right now to bring flowers and thank Dad and leave apples and carrots for the deer.
They come to pound it out on Saturday. I'll post a picture later.
Thanks Dad ❤
Bb, Firebird
.