Post by Ribbs on Aug 4, 2005 5:00:27 GMT -5
In the summer of my sixteenth year I found employment as a ‘landscape engineer’ for a third-rate amusement park (now long defunct) called Marco Polo Park, near my home in Daytona Beach, Florida. Basically my job was to be one of a crew mowing the copious acres of thick grass in and around the park.
Running thru the park was a murky man-made river with extremely steep twelve to twenty foot high banks on either side. I was assigned the task to keep said banks freshly mown with a small wheel-less lawnmower that kinda worked like a mini hovercraft. The banks were so steep that one had to basically cling like a crab to the grass while dangling the mower below oneself, swinging it back and forth in a pendulum movement. If that wasn’t nuts enough already every so often one’s shoes would slip on the slick grass, causing one to lose grip on the handle and send the spinning mower skittering down the bank to flip over upside down on the shallow edge of the river. There it would wait, blades a-whirling, like a ravenous alligator anxious to consume the feet and hands of the hapless teenage victim scrambling to keep from sliding into the maw. After this happened to your humble narrator a few times the mother of invention that is necessity set off a light bulb in my nascent noggin – why not get the park to purchase golf shoes now for the crew, thereby preventing us from having to purchase artificial extremities later? My idea was put “under consideration”.
One particularly blisteringly hot and humid day (which is saying a lot, considering that we are talking about central Florida in midsummer) I suffered another of the hovermower mishaps, this time tumbling into the water right next to the disappointed mower. Now I was mad. Without putting on my shirt I stormed up the bank and into the main part of the park to implore the heartless management one more time to PLEASE get us some cleated shoes. Much to my chagrin, however, I was promptly chewed out rather loudly and semi-publicly for having the temerity to walk amongst the paltry amount of patrons in the park sans shirt! My shoe demands were ignored and I was told to get back to work and leave the management offices immediately. And put on my damn shirt!
Okay, now I was ticked off. I was assigned with one of my buddies to mow a huge field in a remote part of the park that was only visible from the obligatory kiddie choo-choo train that circumnavigated the grounds on an elevated track. The grass was very thick – maybe 10” high or more. The train had been broken all week so we stripped off our shirts again, knowing that we were well out of sight. I proceeded to mow into the grass the first monosyllabic multifunctional English word that comes to mind in such circumstances. Each line was two mower swaths wide, each of the four letters about twenty feet high. The ‘F’ alone could probably have been seen by passengers on airliners on approach to Orlando. When finished, I scrambled up onto the track, calling up my pal Mitch to admire my handiwork and superior use of the language. As we were both laughing and relaxing on the track I heard a sound that I can still hear to this day – Woo… Woo-oooo…! Omigod, they fixed the damn train! And it was coming around the bend, filled with little kiddies and mommies enjoying the Florida sunshine. There was absolutely nothing I could do – it had taken me a half hour to complete my expressive grass carving. We tried to distract the kids as the train went by, to no avail. They were all pointing at the word in the grass, their mothers gasping and covering their little eyes, the engineer just slowly shaking his head as they chugged by.
I simply went directly to my locker, collected my stuff, and went home. I learned later that my official dismissal form stated that I had been fired for “writing an obscenity with a lawnmower”.
I wonder if any of those little kids remember the day they learned how to spell that word.
Running thru the park was a murky man-made river with extremely steep twelve to twenty foot high banks on either side. I was assigned the task to keep said banks freshly mown with a small wheel-less lawnmower that kinda worked like a mini hovercraft. The banks were so steep that one had to basically cling like a crab to the grass while dangling the mower below oneself, swinging it back and forth in a pendulum movement. If that wasn’t nuts enough already every so often one’s shoes would slip on the slick grass, causing one to lose grip on the handle and send the spinning mower skittering down the bank to flip over upside down on the shallow edge of the river. There it would wait, blades a-whirling, like a ravenous alligator anxious to consume the feet and hands of the hapless teenage victim scrambling to keep from sliding into the maw. After this happened to your humble narrator a few times the mother of invention that is necessity set off a light bulb in my nascent noggin – why not get the park to purchase golf shoes now for the crew, thereby preventing us from having to purchase artificial extremities later? My idea was put “under consideration”.
One particularly blisteringly hot and humid day (which is saying a lot, considering that we are talking about central Florida in midsummer) I suffered another of the hovermower mishaps, this time tumbling into the water right next to the disappointed mower. Now I was mad. Without putting on my shirt I stormed up the bank and into the main part of the park to implore the heartless management one more time to PLEASE get us some cleated shoes. Much to my chagrin, however, I was promptly chewed out rather loudly and semi-publicly for having the temerity to walk amongst the paltry amount of patrons in the park sans shirt! My shoe demands were ignored and I was told to get back to work and leave the management offices immediately. And put on my damn shirt!
Okay, now I was ticked off. I was assigned with one of my buddies to mow a huge field in a remote part of the park that was only visible from the obligatory kiddie choo-choo train that circumnavigated the grounds on an elevated track. The grass was very thick – maybe 10” high or more. The train had been broken all week so we stripped off our shirts again, knowing that we were well out of sight. I proceeded to mow into the grass the first monosyllabic multifunctional English word that comes to mind in such circumstances. Each line was two mower swaths wide, each of the four letters about twenty feet high. The ‘F’ alone could probably have been seen by passengers on airliners on approach to Orlando. When finished, I scrambled up onto the track, calling up my pal Mitch to admire my handiwork and superior use of the language. As we were both laughing and relaxing on the track I heard a sound that I can still hear to this day – Woo… Woo-oooo…! Omigod, they fixed the damn train! And it was coming around the bend, filled with little kiddies and mommies enjoying the Florida sunshine. There was absolutely nothing I could do – it had taken me a half hour to complete my expressive grass carving. We tried to distract the kids as the train went by, to no avail. They were all pointing at the word in the grass, their mothers gasping and covering their little eyes, the engineer just slowly shaking his head as they chugged by.
I simply went directly to my locker, collected my stuff, and went home. I learned later that my official dismissal form stated that I had been fired for “writing an obscenity with a lawnmower”.
I wonder if any of those little kids remember the day they learned how to spell that word.