The Boy Next Door

Not everyone has their last born child, the one they tried to give away, move next door to them. But I had mine move next door. In the summer he mows my lawn. In the winter he shovels my sidewalks.

And bonus ... this week ... Richard showed me how to change the electrical chords so that I can use my VHS tapes, and then rehook up my DVD player. I didn’t want to learn how, but he made me. Richard changed the spotlights at the back of my house, from burned out to shining brightly. Nice to walk into the back yard and not have to pretend I am blind when it is late at night and so dark that I can’t see. Especially good now that the deep, dark hours of winter are coming.

Richard goes hunting most weekends. . One outing when the animals were scarce, he did find a skull that has horns attached. I saw him putting those on his head and chasing Vegas around the yard. Good dog game, especially now that we have changed our backyard from 2 yards to 1 yard – a lot of good space there now for dog games.

Last night he called to see if he could put a coupled of hooks in the garage from which to hang his moose. “You got a moose?” I said, excitedly “That’s great!”.

“No,” he said. “I am just planning ahead in case I do get one and need to hang it for a couple of weeks before I get it butchered.”

Stay tuned. The hunting season is not over.

I know from my childhood, when hunting season begins. That is the day that my mother cooks a big Thanksgiving dinner for the rest of us, and the day that my dad heads to the hills to get game for the coming winter.

And when Richard asked if he could hang a moose in my garage, I could remember an animal hanging in our basement when I was a child (maybe more than one), down by the washing machine. In fact maybe more than one animal hung there, for I can remember the sweet meat smell of bear.

Hanging a moose out in the garage seemed like such a better alternative than my basement, that I was happy to say yes.