I just finished working outside a good bit this past Sunday and it was so enjoyable. I love doing work outside and all the things that go along with it.
The sweat…
The gnats…
The calluses…
Waitaminit. I actually hate working outside.
That said, I don’t hate being outside. I love hiking on a mountain trail, rock climbing, or even adventuring in the countryside or through thick woods. Sweat and calluses from that is just fine…but the gnats still suck. It’s just the working outside that I dislike. I try to avoid it as much as I can, and according to my parents, I always have. In fact, I remember one day in my youth I had to rake the yard clear of pine straw (otherwise known as pine needles if you’re not from the south). Now it’s important to understand that I lived on over 2 acres, so when I say yard I really mean field.
Hmm…maybe this is why I don’t like working outside…
As fate would have it a friend wanted me to come over and play that day, but of course my slave masters parents wouldn’t let me go until I had finished raking. What’s a boy to do?
Get your friend to help of course. So I did. I explained that I couldn’t go play until the raking was done, and he helped out so it was done in record time. In a sense, it was an important life lesson that teamwork can overcome obstacles.
Yeah, that sounds nice and meaningful. Certainly more so than, “Solicit your friends for help in your chores and you can play more.”
I would also tend to come up with clever ways to do jobs, like rigging up a wagon to my bicycle to move logs rather than just use a wheelbarrow. This invariably ended up making a 5 minute job take 30 minutes, but it wasn’t about the result, it was about the journey.
Gee, that sounds nice and meaningful too. What am I writing here, a self-help guide?
I’m pleased to announce that my daughter has inherited my knack for extending job times to make them more interesting without any input from me. She created a dumbwaiter of sorts with some ribbons, a couple coat hangers, and a laundry basket. This, of course, was to avoid walking down the stairs to bring her dirty laundry. Or her homework. Maybe a toy or two. Oh, and if you wanted to bring anything upstairs to her, it needed to go in the basket. Or else.
There was also the time she rigged up a wagon to the Razor Quad (Like father, like daughter) to haul moving blankets that had been used for a front yard tent back down to the basement.
By experiencing these inventions from the other side I’ve realized that I probably annoyed my parents sometimes by taking so long to do things. However, I’ve also realized that this outlet of creativity helped mold me into the person I am today.
OK, now I’m absolutely convinced this is a self-help guide. I’ll stop now.
Uhm…er…believe in yourself and stuff.
