This solstice I awoke to lawnmowers, just one, the riding mower Brian pilots as he mows my yard and the ones adjacent and across the street. It’s winter solstice and in Wyoming I didn’t wake up to lawnmowers. Snowblowers sound similar but the pitch is different, closer to a screech than a roar. And the mowers move quickly as they crisscross the salt-air-resistant St. Augustine grass that is like a weaving rather than the upright bluegrass or fine fescue of Wyoming. Yes, bluegrass, a lawn type suited more for the green of Kentucky racehorse pastures than the brown of the high prairie. When bluegrass matures, it feels fine on bare feet. Not so the Florida varietal; its runners poke feet. It keeps growing after summer and Brian is here every other week in December instead of every week in June. The Florida rains arrive and you can almost watch the grass grow.
Winter solstice announces the rough part of winter and the
beginning of longer bouts of sun although we barely notice it day by day.
Summer solstice announces the glorious days of summer and the slow passage of
the sun across the sky or so it seems when you live in the Sunshine State and
you work mowing lawns or pounding nails or laying down roofing shingles. Brian
finishes the big front law and moves to the back. He makes three passes in my
tiny yard and then he’s on to Number 70
or Number 66 or motors across the street to Number 67. I hear him most of the
morning and it’s odd is what it is, this summer sound at Christmastime. Soon
the leafblower erupts and it’s more akin to snowblowers and I wish I found
comfort in it but don’t.
In Florida and Wyoming, the sounds of December 21 mean one
thing: summer is coming. In Wyoming, it takes its own sweet time. In Florida,
well, it’s already here.
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