Yesterday – day ‘who knows’ in coronavirus days – was a day I won’t forget easily. It started like any other day, but I was soon to learn that even when you can go nowhere and do nothing, everything can go wrong.
I decided early in the day that when I finished my usual chores, I’d venture into the sunshine and clean my car and attempt a few other job — just to shake up the routine. As I drank coffee on the decking at the back of my little unit, I noticed my tiny red car looked dirtier than I thought it would be. I grabbed the keys and walked towards it. As I got closer, my stomach churned a little as the unpleasant smell reached my nose.
Upon a closer look, my car was covered in bird feathers, sticking to the car with the blood and remains of some sort of bird, obviously the victim of a cat. It was horrible. I readied my car for cleaning and was never so happy when it was finished. The warm day had not helped the odour. Was it coincidence that I decided to clean the car just at that time?
For a couple of weeks I have been trying to get my lawn mowed. It is a task I can no longer do without great distress and difficulty. The young man who has been doing it has stopped answering his phone or messages. Just yes or no would have been sufficient. I checked and gardening services were still allowed.
I tried calling a number from a card that had been left in my letterbox, advertising this service — nothing. There was nothing for it but to try to do it myself. It was becoming a jungle out there and the rains were coming.
I needed to wait till at least late-morning to give the grass time to dry out, then away I went. The bloody grass was very wet underneath.
I emptied the catcher once and went to restart mower. Nothing! I won’t tell you over the next hour or so, how many or what expletives were heard echoing across the breeze.
Hours later, I had to concede I had perhaps a spark plug or carburettor problem and absolutely no energy or inclination to try to fix them. I was hot, dirty and my back ached. My lungs were protesting as I’m sure was my little overworked heart.
What a mess in my overgrown yard, with the ‘always’ wet grass and no sign of actual lawn. When would I learn to leave well enough alone?
When I had sufficiently recovered, my next job was to sweep down the decking, remove spiderwebs and wipe over outdoor furniture. Just a small area — easy, you might say.
As I leaned on the broom, too heavily it seems, it snapped, not just a little down the handle but close enough to make it impossible to use. Murphy’s Law had kicked in. No, we are in pandemic mode. I am not going to the shop just for a broom.
‘That’s it, I’m done,’ I thought. I could hear the man across the way chatting to his little girl. I imagined him saying, “There she goes, the mad lady who sings ‘Briggs and Stratton’, ‘Bedknobs and Broomsticks’, ‘Feed the Birds’, all day long.”
I did not sleep well, my mind was full of a very untidy, unfinished and wet, back yard. My mind was full of Covid-19 and how badly our north-west coast here in Tasmania is suffering.
I headed for my happy place, the beach. It was 7:45am.
My little dog was happy. We only go once a week now. It was dull, readying itself to rain. The air was cool, but not cold. As I walked along the side of the gentle lapping water, watching my dog run happily along, I felt my shoulders relax. I started to laugh, not too loudly. I didn’t want people to think I was really mad. What a day yesterday had been, but how funny it was now.
Today? Today the tide was still ebbing, the clouds formed little pictures in the sky and in my beloved Kingston everyone was practising social distancing nicely as they went about their daily exercise. The wet, messy grass, will be there tomorrow, the dust will blow from the decking. In a world of uncertainties, these things are certain.
The moral to my story? Slow down everyone, relax, treat yourself nicely. Oh, and light a match under all lawn mowers.