Gravedigger, With Friends

Sunday was a groundbreaking day for the community garden. After a late night with the musical presentation on Saturday, we had arranged to meet Dave and his Kubota down at the garden site around 10. Of course it had to be the hottest day of the entire year. Usually in Frenchboro, a high of 60 is terribly balmy. I swear it was 80. Dave got to work tearing out the thick thatched grasses with the back hoe. People started showing up. Sort of like the Pied Piper, wherever heavy machinery goes, the kids follow. As the clods of soil and grasses built up, Doug fired up Gravedigger. Perhaps it was performance anxiety, I'm not sure, but that rototiller was possessed. It started leaping into the air like a bucking bronco. Thank goodness Doug didn't release the handle or that demonic tiller would have taken off across the garden, attacking everyone in its path. If I hadn't been laughing so hard, I would have had a heart attack. Needless to say, after that we were happy to see Mikey arrive on Jay's backhoe, so there were two backhoes making a tough job much easier. Can you imagine pitchforking a 70' X 30' plot by hand? no thanks. I don't care how many hands you have, that does NOT make light work, letmetellya. So...from 10 am to 4 pm there was a group down at the garden opening up the soil and making a mucky mess out of themselves. Though we added meaning to the word 'red neck' with our burnt skin, it was time well spent and it looks like things will be moving forward as scheduled. I can't thank everyone enough for all their hard work. Some of those kids were troopers. Just look at that shot of Myron and Brody at the end of the day...they were in a coma. I told them to smile for the camera and that was the look they gave me...lady, you've gotta be kidding us, we can't even move, let alone smile! Next weeked we're putting up the fencing. Be there or be square!