Thanksgiving. A time of family, food, and fun—as I recently
heard it defined. Yes, I have another Thanksgiving tale.
The year was 1985. I had just moved to Wisconsin in
anticipation of getting married. My wife, who wasn’t my wife yet, and her
family traveled to spend the holiday in another town. I had to work so I stayed
behind to keep the house warm for the cat and dog.
Now before anyone starts feeling sorry for me, I wasn’t
alone. For Thanksgiving Day, I was invited to some friends’ house. We had a
good southern meal—odd for being in Wisconsin, I know, but these people
were from the south—and afterward, we spent the day playing games. I stayed
until well after dark and then returned to my future in-laws’ house.
Meanwhile, it had been snowing—all day. It was still snowing
when I left for work the next morning—and when I returned. And, it continued
snowing well into Saturday. By this time, the long driveway was pretty snowed
in. I’d been driving my father-in-law’s four-wheel drive pickup and hadn’t
bothered to think about removing any of the piles of white stuff. And neither
had I thought to shovel. Probably should have started that the first day,
instead of playing games all day long!
Waking up Saturday, I suddenly remembered my wife’s family
would be returning that afternoon and they had taken a car, a car that I knew
would have difficulty getting into and up the snow filled driveway.
So, I thought I’d help out. I went to the shed and started
up the John Deere with a snowplow already attached. I figured the job would
only take a few minutes. Well, as anyone who has been around me knows, that Mr.
Murphy guy and me have a lot in common—if anything can go wrong, it will. I’d
made only one pass down the driveway, when the John Deere stopped. Just
stopped. I tried for several hours to get it running but apparently, I wasn’t
much of a mechanic.
Looking at the driveway, I knew it would still be hard to
get a car through it. The one pass I’d made hadn’t really helped much at all.
So, I jumped into the pickup and drove back and forth until I had the snow
packed down enough. Then I started working on shoveling the three days’ worth
of snow from around the walkway and the house. By that time, I knew I
definitely had waited too long to shovel. It was late afternoon when my wife
and her family drove in and I still hadn’t finished.
My father-in-law, being a far better mechanic than I, seemed
unconcerned with the stalled John Deere. As I recall, he had the tractor
running in about two minutes. Then, while he cleaned up the driveway a little,
I continued working on the shoveling.
I did apologize for breaking his tractor. He said not to
worry about it, that any time a breakdown didn’t cost any money, it was good.
Well, that’s true, except it had cost some money—I think I used close to
a full tank of gas driving the pickup back and forth! But, as I recently
learned, Thanksgiving is, among other things, a time of fun. And I certainly did
have fun!
Happy Thanksgiving! ~
Bruce
A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books, including: Inside Room 913, Over My Dead Body, The Journey,
Miscarriage Of Justice, and The Wynn Garrett
Series. Available in ebook and paperback on iTunes, Amazon, Barnes &
Noble, Kobo, and Smashwords. Amazon
Profile - http://www.amazon.com/Bruce-A.-Borders/e/B006SOLWQS.
Bruce A. Borders is a proud member of Rave Reviews Book Club.
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