IF YOU ARE RECEIVING THIS POST IN YOUR EMAIL INBOX, CLICK ON THE TITLE OF THE POST TO READ IT IN ITS NATURAL SETTING ON MY BLOGSITE.
The weekly prompt from my Florida writers’ group was “the lawn”, and this is my response. An additional challenge was to tell a story with a twist.
My daddy complained each time that it rained, Soaking into our green, front lawn. “The rain makes grass grow!” he’d curse, soft and low, Wishing it just would be gone. But when the sun came, it also got blame For helping the grass to grow. For that always meant my daddy got sent Outside in the heat to mow.
He had a lawnmower with which he would lower The height of each blade of grass, But it took him hours, avoiding Mum’s flowers, Or she would hand him his ass! He’d curse and he’d moan, a tad overblown, Back and forth across the lawn, Cutting the grass down, his face in a frown, Until at last he was done.
But then one sad day, he looked o’er my way, Saw me lounging by the pool. “It’s ‘bout time we shared this job,” he declared. “You’re makin’ me look the fool!” I wasn’t impressed at ending my rest To take over his irksome task, But I gave it a go if only to show All he had to do was ask.
But Daddy was quick once I took a lick, And soon the job was all mine! I sweated and toiled while Daddy, well-oiled, Got a tan in the warm sunshine. And now it was him who went for a swim While I pushed that mower hard, Cursed the rain and sun, just like he had done, For growing grass in our yard.
But now, I don’t mow the lawn when it grows, I just let it go to seed. And nobody’s there to utter a care That everywhere there’s a weed! I’m back by the pool, and everything’s cool, For at long last, Daddy’s gone To his final rest…and have you already guessed? I buried him under the lawn!
The thirteenth novel in my Maggie Keiller/Derek Sloan crime series will be published later this year, titled The Lonely, Silvery Rain. Here is an excerpted chapter from that book, slightly modified for this blog-post. If you have read previous books in the series, you will recognize the two characters here.
When Old Scratch, as Senator Nicholl disdainfully referred to death, came calling for the final time on a warm, drizzly, late-morning in October, he found Nicholl dozing in his favourite rocking chair on the wide, open-air verandah of his century home. The rain was thrumming on the shingled roof, dripping off the overhanging eaves, spilling like a shimmering, crystalline waterfall to the gardens below.
Before his spectral visitor crept in, Nicholl had been engrossed in a pleasant dream, delivering a stem-winder of a stump speech on another political campaign trail, surrounded by a throng of friends and constituents in someone’s farmyard. Balancing on a rickety, upside-down milking-bucket, he stood above everyone, so even those at the far reaches of the crowd could see him. He felt he’d never been in finer voice until, gearing up for the customary, full-throated culmination to his peroration, he discovered he’d forgotten what he was about to say. The shock was profound.
Groping vainly in his dream to remember the remarks eluding him, his mouth continued moving, though no sound emerged. Then, without warning, the bottom abruptly dropped away beneath him, as if someone had kicked the bucket out from under his feet. The world whirled and spun dizzyingly as he toppled, flinging his arms out in a futile attempt to catch himself. Despite the confusion and fear engulfing him, however, he still tried to finish, a campaigner to the end.
Wait! My speech! I’m purt’ near done…
But the dream turned nightmarish, and a misty, reddish haze descended across his eyes, and then…and then…
Senator Milford Nicholl, the simple, hometown boy-made-good, eased back in his rocking chair, sighed a fare-thee-well, and went to his eternal rest.
The many well-wishers who stopped in later that afternoon found Gloria, his wife of sixty years, shaken but composed, unbelieving but accepting, sad but relieved that her husband’s travails were over.
“He knew he was on borrowed time,” she told them softly, “and I could tell he knew his days were winding down. A wife always knows these things…” Her throat filled up, and she stopped to wipe away tears.
“Just a few days ago,” she whispered after a moment or two, summoning a small smile, “we talked about the possibility of one of us dying. And you know Milly’s sense of humour. He said something to the effect that he wasn’t afraid to die, he just didn’t want to be there when it happens.”
The mourners laughed at that, and a few shared more of the homespun witticisms they remembered flowing from Nicholl’s febrile mind. Eventually, Gloria told them she really would like time alone. “I’ll pray a little,” she said, “cry a little, laugh a little. There’ll be time enough later to reminisce some more. And I’ll call you if I need to, I promise.”
As everyone took their leave, Gloria waved from the verandah, then sat and rocked slowly in her husband’s favourite chair, his abandoned walker standing forsaken beside it. The rain was gentler now, but its sibilant pit-a-patting on the roof was still audible, its runoff still dripping off the eaves into the lush gardens below, covered by sodden, autumn-hued leaves. The unseasonably warm breeze caressed her, enveloping her in a blanket of solace.
She already understood she’d be missing Milly constantly from now on—his irrepressibility, his cornball turns-of-phrase, his devotion to the community—and most of all, his love for her, his very presence. She counted herself lucky to have been his partner and to have known such happiness.
Her grief over losing him would linger long, of course. She knew mourning is not something that can be quantified or measured by time. But at this particular moment, she was at peace with his passing, attuned to the happy memories she would cherish forever, resigned to the loneliness she knew would envelop her from time to time. They were all part of everyone’s journey through life.
But for right now, she was snuggled in Milly’s chair, at one with the inevitable rhythms of life and death, at one with herself, her soul in harmony with the comforting cadence of the rain.
tallandtruetales 