One after Another

I have been patient many times in my life. Sometimes I have had to be more patient than other times. There is one day that sticks out to me the most. It was a crisp, blue, sunny day in 2017 when I got woken up by my phone alarm ringing. It was my grandfather, I answer, “What’s up?” He goes on for about a min or two on how he would like me to come over and help do some yard work. Nothing much just help him rake a little bit before the midday comes. I had plans later in the day around 3 ish. My friends invited me to go out to dinner and go see a movie. He said before midday so I thought it would be alright if I went over to help him.

He picked me up around 11:00 am in his maroon pickup truck and we were on our way to his house. We get there and there is an atrocious amount of leaves. It looked as though it had been raining leaves for days on end, but little did I know this was just the start of it. I went into the tiny brown shed where he keeps all of his gardening tools and such, the back left corner is where he always keeps it. But it was nowhere to be seen, so I started looking around thinking to myself “this shed is so small I should be able to find it somewhere.” I couldn’t find it anywhere, I looked under toats, in corners. It wasn’t hanging on the wall by the looks of it so I decided after about 10 mins of searching to ask him where he put it. I ask him “Where is the rake?” he answers me and says “I put it in the shed. Did you look in there?” I told him I have been looking in there for the past 10 mins. So I go back to the shed and look again. As I am approaching this shed I see the rake leaning up against the side of the shed. I let out a sigh and grabbed the rake and get to raking. After what seemed like an eternity I get a big pile in the middle of the yard, but I have only done about an eighth of the yard so far. I turn my back for one second and a huge gust of wind blows. I’m thinking to myself “Please don’t be ruined, please don’t be ruined.” I look behind me, only to see the worst. The pile was everywhere. I wanted to give up so bad, I sat there in mental exhaustion and disappointment. “Should I stop and leave?” “Maybe I should lie about the time.” I kept to my job though and I kept raking no matter what. After about 2 hours I have about 3/4 of the yard done. I am so close, but this yard is so big I am thinking. I get another pile going and my Pop Pop calls me inside. I really don’t want to leave but I do. He says he needs help with the dishes, I don’t want to disappoint him so I say I can help. Little did I know there was a mountain of dishes in the sink and he doesn’t have a dishwasher. All I am thinking at this moment is I am never gonna make it to the movie at this rate. I scrub as fast as I can no matter if I got all of the dishes or not, I am just rinsing, washing, and repeating.

45 min go by and it is 2 PM. I just finished washing the last of the dishes and sprint out of the house almost tripping on my way out. It takes about 30 minutes to get to the movies from here so I had to move fast, I grabbed the rake and started. I was raking so fast it was making marks into the yard. I was moving as fast as lightning. I get 1 small pile, then 2 then 3. I am making great time but I need to keep it up if I want to make it in time. But all of a sudden I feel a bend and pressure be released. The rake had snapped, I looked down in disbelief. There is no way this broke I thought to myself. Now was not the time for complaining, I immediately went to Pop-Pop and told him what had happened. He was upset with me but I was doing all this work for him so he wasn’t too frustrated. He has a spare down in the basement. Thankfully he grabbed that one for me and I went right back out to work. I finally finish the last bit and We get on our way to the movies. I keep checking my phone but we are too late. We are 10 mins late to the movies and my friends are all there. I was embarrassed but at least I made it there as quick as possible. I learned to be patient and the best way to go about it is to not complain. If I would have complained I would have been even later.

“Leaves” by James Jardine is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0