Of course I would wake up at six AM my only day off and be unable to go back to sleep. I refused to get up so just watched the news and weather shows til noon. Feeling finally rested I got up and hopped on my honey, Johnny Dear to cut the back yard which was in dire need of cutting. It takes so long for it to dry out enough to ride my my big heavy Johnny back there but my next day off is Monday and by then the dogs wouldn't be able to see over the grass and I wouldn't be able to see them out there either! Since shattering my dining room window a few weeks back , I'm scared to even cut anywhere close to the house so it takes me thirty minutes to weed eat around the kitchen door and remaining dining room windows. Then I get back on Johnny raising the blade up one level starting in the center of the yard around the fire pit and cut going the opposite way to blow all the clippings out until I reach the fence so the yard is free of grass clippings the dogs would love to tramp into the house with covering all twelve paws. Cutting the yard is a science to me. I feel like I have my degree in Yardology. Then I rake up all the clippings from around the back door and windows and dump them in the fire pit which isn't really a fire pit when it rains for a week...it's a small pond surrounded by huge rocks I toted home one by one from building sites when nearby neighborhoods were being built.
Yes I am a scrounger, but has brought me many great results. Case in point:
This was my front yard on the fourth of July...
And this is my front yard nine days later!
This was my side yard nine days ago
And this is my side yard today
Bam! There you have it folks, all for Free Ninety Nine and all it took was eight trips to and from the sod pile and a couple to and from the dumpster. I know all my neighbors were looking out their windows at me nine days ago telling each other "Look at that insane skinny old woman who lives across the street putting down dead scraps of sod." Today they looked out their windows and wish they knew where I got it!
After finishing the back yard today I jumped in the shower and Massey and I headed up to Little Five Points in Atlanta. I usually always drive but Massey has never really driven on the interstate and it's high time she learns, especially since she starts at Georgia State University next month smack dab in the middle of downtown Atlanta. She asked if I felt safe with her driving and told her there was only one way to find out. Off we went!
She did great. It gets a little crowded when you get to Hartsfield Airport but by then you only have fifteen minutes to go. I snapped this picture when we rounded the curve in East Point, the town I grew up in. It's the first glimpse you have of downtown Atlanta and is always a sight to see. Today it suddenly became hard to see because the rain started.
Massey commented "So I guess this is God's idea of a funny joke. Let's make it rain the first time Massey drives into downtown Atlanta."
No worries, five minutes later the rain stopped and we were now just ten minutes away.
It gets hairy once you hit the city and people drive like idiots but my girl did great!
I even felt safe enough to multitask and take pictures. When you hit the Grady curve even a seasoned driver sometimes thinks "Yikes" so I concentrated on telling her which lane she needed to be in to get off at The Carter Center/ Freedom Parkway exit. When she pulled to the first stop light on the Freedom Parkway we high fived.
When I was a teen we drove into Atlanta at least once a week when just sixteen but it was a lot smaller city then.
I'm not sure who was prouder, me or her when we pulled into The Junkman's Daughter parking lot. We walked around our favorite part of Atlanta simply window shopping and people watching. We finished up at our favorite store, Rag O Rama and I bought a cute print top for $6.50. Massey bought a beautiful black linen top for $8.00.
This isn't the black top she bought but is the girl who drove her momma smack into the middle of the busiest city in the south east. I have exactly thirty nine days left with her then she'll be gone. If she loves the college life like I did, I won't be seeing much of her. Of course I loved college life for different and totally wrong reasons...that's what going to Georgia Southern College did back then in the late seventies. My Diddy drove me and my room mate who I never met until the morning we picked her up to ride down with us to Statesboro early in August. We didn't go home until Thanksgiving.
The good thing is I am still dear friends with my college room mate. As you can tell from the photo she is still a doll and Massey loves her to death, just as I do! The peeps you meet in college are usually friends for life.
I hope Massey makes life long friends too. It's a bittersweet feeling I have about this. I'm losing my "Bestie" and she's off to make new ones. She's always chosen friends wisely so there are no worries there. I just hope I don't lose my spot in line.
I actually teared up when I wrote that last sentence.
Guess I better get used to it. It's hard to send the last one off. It's hard to think that the day you thought about for years and years is less than forty days away.
She's always been a princess. She almost killed me and herself just coming into this world but we both survived.
She's given me more good times than bad and being a momma who raised two boys first knew that would happen but was thrilled about how few bad times happened with her!
So she's off to make her mark in the world next month! At least now she knows how to get there.
I love my boys and I love my girl. All three are different but all three are equally loved. All three have chosen different paths and directions but at least they are branching , reaching and moving in the right direction.
Looks like soon the neighbors will be looking out their windows saying "Look at that crazy old skinny woman wandering around aimlessly."
I still have over a month, just preparing myself!
Til next time...COTTON
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