Trabajando con las manos

There are few things that I do less than manual labor. I haven't had a lawn to take care of in years and the last few jobs I had involved a tie or at least a button up shirt. But that's not to say I'm averse to it. If I need to I'll get my hands dirty and work up a sweat. I might not do it as long as the next guy, but that's mainly because I'm out of shape and I find the comfort of the shade far more enticing. Yet here I am in South America, on vacation, mowing the lawn. Now this isn't an ordinary lawn, this is a lawn that has been through at least ten REALLY good rains in the last 3 weeks and has REALLY responded to it. Well. It looked like a jungle.

There are times in your life that you just need, NEED to get off your butt and move. Not just move but actually do something. Something that when you are done you can look back on and say, "I did that.". Where as you sit back with a nice cool drink in the waning afternoon light you are filled with a sense of accomplishment. Yesterday was one of those days for me.

Claudia's boyfriends name is Martin and he does lawn work in the area. Yesterday he came by to cut Grandma's lawn and I practically begged him to let me help. Imagine that. A skinny dude trying really hard to ask in beaten up spanish if he can please, oh please push the lawn mower around. After some eyebrow raising and Martin actually verifying in english (P.S. - The people down here speak a hell of a lot more english than they let on), he gassed up the mower and let me have a go. So I started and realized that mowing a lawn was a lot like riding a bike. You never really forget. After a couple of passes it hits me, I'm working! I'm actually working! Yes! I can just see my cool drink waiting for me. Sitting on a small table all by itself, afternoon sun glistening off the cool condensation running down the sides from all the ice inside. It would have to be citrus of course, probably lemon. Then I ran over a cactus. No big deal, I just didn't see it under all that grass. I realized that in order to finish, I needed to actually pay attention. So I kept mowing while Martin edged and my lofty desires of accomplishment soon were broken down into reality, hot and dirty. The mower ran out of gas and Martin and I switched places. I felt that even though I didn't finish the lawn, I finished a tank of gas. I had accomplished something! So there it was, I was too tired (out of shape) to make that delicious beverage and in the evening I went to bed a little worn and a little itchy.

I woke up this morning still itchy. There was something in the back of my knee that was irritating the hell out of me. I thought, Allergies? bug bites? No. Cactus spines. Apparently the cactus I had run over threw up a cloud of spines that had either lodged in my shorts, or landed in the crease of my knee and were worked in by walking around. Nurse Dani was able to pull a few of the more offending spines out but they are those really tiny, fuzzy type that elude you no matter what you do. In the end I feel great. I own that lawn now, at least half of it any way. I got hot and dirty. There were trying times, but I got through them. I realized that I didn't need some plantation owners dream of drinking a mint julep on my porch. I received the real reward for a job well done. Cactus spines. In the back of the knee. =)