David Heiller
It was kind of comical, although no one saw it, and that was good.
I was heading out to the barn on Sunday morning. I spun to my left and started walking toward the garden, then I spun to my right and went toward the garage.
I must have looked like a 51-year-old ballet dancer. Not a pretty sight, I might add.
Yet I bet I wasn’t the only guy doing the Springtime Pirouette.
That’s the kind of day it was. A real spring day. Not a temptress like I wrote about last month, the kind that beckons with a coy smile and dumps 18 inches of snow on you.
No, this was the real deal.
Hence the dance of the undecided. There is so much to do, and so much you want to do. So it’s off to the barn to move that pile of lumber. No wait! That garden soil is ready for its first hoe of the season. And the car in the garage, got to take that battery charger off. They all have to get done, and all at once, because it’s a beautiful spring day.
Ah, but then you stop. Daylight savings time just kicked in. The days are long and getting longer. And you realize that while you may not have all the time in the world, this is a day that needs some good pacing, and a smile or two. Settle down. Find that good old work pace.
It always goes that way for me, every year about now, like clockwork. Maybe it does for you too, if you work a day job, and have spent the last five months going to work in the dark and getting home in the dark. You lose that rhythm of outside work, the kind that comes naturally to loggers and farmers and carpenters. For the rest of us, there’s a bit of rediscovery.
It doesn’t take long. For me, I just did my goofy dance, then it was time to enjoy the day of work.
Enjoy work? Yes, those words go together this time of year. Temperature in the 60s. A slight breeze. Birds singing like mad. The grass turning green practically before your eyes. How can you not enjoy that walk through the soft soil of the garden? You see the possibilities, see the squash vines, the ripe pumpkins.
That pile of lumber, it practically moves itself. It’s a fun job, fun in a strange way to feel the strain in your back, the scrape of wood on your bare arms.
And that good spring day needs a bit of relaxing too. Mid-afternoon, a cold soda, some chips. A visit with a good book on the deck, out of the sun.
Then work calls again. Walking the yard, picking up sticks, Grandma Schnick style, raking up pine cones.
And eyeing projects. My Sunday ended with post hole digger in hand. It was such a fine Sunday that Cindy’s clothes line had moved the the top of my list. She’s only waited a year. It’s time! Now if there is a tougher job than digging a post hole in Grade A Thomford clay, I would like to know it. But on a fine spring day, even that job was decent. OK, not fun, but I didn’t die.
A couple more days like last Sunday and I’ll get it done.
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