Boat Floating

I took my first spin on a riding lawn mower this weekend.  I suppose there are more exciting things I could have done, but that kind of floated my boat.

I love mowing the lawn.  I really do.  And right now I might love it even more because I never get to do it and you know what absence does to the heart.  Mostly I love mowing the lawn because I think it smells good.  Cut grass smells better to me than clean laundry.  It's green, and fresh and strong.  The smell of rain comes in either a close second or maybe a tie with cut grass.  So just in case you are wondering right now, "Does Jessica dig earthiness?"  which I'm sure you are wondering at this very second, let me tell you what, I totally do.

Anyhow, up to Friday evening of this very last weekend, I'd only used a push mower, almost always bare footed.  With the size of the lawn we have now, that means a minimum of 3 hours of pushing.  But we got a windfall when our neighbors moved a couple of weeks ago.  They gave us their riding mower for real cheap.  Spouse-the-One-In-Charge-of-Telling-Me-How-to-Turn-On-Things-That-Are-of-a-Mechanical-and-Therefore-Boring-Nature showed me how to turn on this new mower before he left.

"You just push this in and pull that out and then turn this and then push that in and then wait and then push that up and then if its all ok then you pull that up and then you're good.  Easy."

I was already bored so I didn't ask him to tell me again.  "The instructions are right here on the mower if you need them," he finished.

I needed them.

I was a little nervous when I realized that Baby Girl was content in her high chair and the other kids were mesmerized enough by Nick Jr. that I could probably sneak away for an hour to mow the lawn.  Spouse-the-Previous-Mower had left the lawn mower parked in the shed the last time he'd use it.  I could see from our kitchen window the behind of the mower sitting at the edge or our doorless shed and I wondered if when I started the mower I'd do something crazy like take out a shed wall.  I didn't want to take out a shed wall.

This made mowing the lawn even more thrilling - this hint of danger.

When I saw the instructions to turn on the lawn mower and that there were like six or seven steps my courage almost failed me.  Instructions can be so boringly intimidating.  But I got through them all - brake, choke, ignition, choke, ummm...that turtle/rabbit lever, and then push on the gas.  Luckily Spouse-the-Seer-of-the-Future was very clear with me on which pedal made me go forward and which pedal made me go backward. 

I crept out of our shed like an aged turtle, trying to remember not to clench my eyes shut.  I made it out without taking down a single shed wall.  And then there I was in the wide open lawn.  Possibility spread out before me.  Long grass needing me to make it shorter washed around my rumbling wheels.  I was a cowgirl on the prairies, and not a sissy-princess cowgirl.  I was a tough cowgirl. 

I had me a good time circling trees and turning the wheel one-handed.

When I was all done I parked the mower back in the shed with a swagger to my back as I bumped onto the concrete pad.  I hardly blinked my eyes when I went through the shed door that is exactly wide enough for the mower. 

I had conquered.

So it was a good weekend for me.  I clean a lot of bathrooms these days and I do piles of laundry and I empty and load the dishwasher at least once a day and I sweep and I vacuum and I clean up toys and clean up toys and clean up toys and make beds.  Not often do I get to start up a new machine all on my own and ride around under a wide blue sky.  Maybe someday it will be cool when on a weekend I hike a huge mountain, or do an incredible climb, or do a fantastically challenging ride.  But for right now, I have to say, this weekend my boat was certainly floated.