No More Pony Rides

I just love mowing the lawn!  It is my favorite outdoor thing to do! Note that I use the term 'lawn' rather loosely here.  We have a country lawn - mostly green stuff (i.e. weeds with a little grass thrown in).  Today I mowed for the last time this year.  It was a beautiful fall day, so I got out there and cut the grass really short for the last time.  I laughingly call my riding mower my horse.  I always tell my husband Harold that "I'm gonna get on my pony and ride".  Those of you who are old enough to remember a song back in 1962 by Dee Dee Sharp called Ride - that's exactly what she sang about - "gonna get on my pony and ride - ride!, ride! ride!".
     Harold usually prepares my 'steed' by filling it with gas and checking the oil and tire pressure.  Then I get on my trusty pony and ride for about 3 hours and cut grass.  I don't really know why I like to cut grass.  Perhaps it's because you can see a job done, or maybe it's because I like the fresh air.  Sometimes it can be a pain in the neck cutting grass, though.  On a hot summer day I get sunburned, the mosquitoes bug me, and I hate the wind in my face.  But I think women do a better job at cutting grass than men do.  Every woman in this neighborhood does most of the grass cutting - we all like to do that.   And we all claim to do a better job than the guys!
     The only thing I don't like about cutting grass is the preparation.  Getting hundreds of feet of garden hose out of the way, rolling up electrical cords, moving pots of flowers and vehicles, or having to mow around low spots or tractors or 'yard ornaments'.  Because we have lots of things plugged in, like electric fencing to protect the beehives against bears, and fencing to keep the deer out of the garden, there is usually hundreds of feet of wires to roll up and plug back in again.  And sometimes there is the hidden danger - a wire I missed, a metal stake, a big rock, or a really low spot that can ruin the mower.  One time I hit some kind of baling wire and it wrapped up around the mower blades into a huge mess.  Another time I hit a piece of metal garden stake and tore up a drive  belt.  Another time I hit a rock and the mower belt tore up AND I ruined a blade.  Once I hit a huge log hidden in tall grass and the mower blade got completely bent.  How many times I have ruined mower belts to these hazards (and those belts are not cheap!).  So I take extra care now to prepare the yard.
     It takes me 3 hours or more to cut all the grass.   I usually do it in one stretch.  Funny how when I am driving a car, I have to stop every hour and stretch, but on the mower I can do the whole 3 hours at one time without a break!  We could mow about 10 acres of lawn, but we only mow about 4 acres or so.   The rest of the yard is left natural for bee food (some folks call these weeds, but we call them wildflowers).  The bees are one source of our livelihood here on the farm, so we can't mow down their food!  When I see a bee on a flower in the grass, I try to avoid hitting it with the mower and wait until the bee is done gathering whatever it wants.  Sometimes I have to avoid frogs in tall grass.  A couple times I have accidentally maimed a frog and I always feel bad about that, but they often jump right in front of the mower.
     So today was my last "pony ride" until next spring, around May.   The mower will be cleaned and put away for the year.  Now I will have lots of "spare time" for other things.  Ha! Probably not.  There is always something to do here on the farm.   But I will sure miss my twice a week rides.............

Sitting on my trusty (pony)ride for the last time this year.