My, how times change.
The lyrics came to mind a couple of weeks ago after I’d lugged and dragged 42 black 60-gallon garbage bags stuffed full of unprocessed plant material to the curb in hopes the City of Springfield would haul it away for me.
Yep, 42 bags, each one of them illegal.
That number contributes to a bit of math that disturbs me nearly as much as my age, and it involves what, for me, isn’t just a story problem; it’s a horror story problem:
If your son is 2 when you move into a modest house on a corner lot with a dozen trees and you collect 30 plus bags of leaves each fall, how many bags will you have collected by the time he turns 39?
If I wanted an answer more specific than “too dad burn many,” my second grandson could do the multiplication for me. But then he’d ask that annoying child question that even adults have asked me about all this: Why, grandpa, why? `Soon, the 3-year-old grandson joins in, because “why” is now his favorite word, too.
That would force me to oil my voice to a high index of reflectivity and say something like: “I rake all these leaves because I know you like to jump in them.” And, having gone that far out on a leafless l limb, I’d probably go totally shameless and “Grandpa does it because he loves you.”
And then I’d go to the board of elections to obtain the paperwork to run for office.
Before you say anything, I get it.
I drive by country houses all the time and shake my head at the amount of acreage that grass-ranchers mow. I realize that my leaf bagging behavior isn’t any more rational and that there likely is treatment available for me.
Still, I fear that I’ve bagged leaves so long that I know more about it than any consenting adult should.
Just so you know: When the leaves are damp or wet, it’s best to put the plastic bag into the plastic barrel and then add the leaves. Wet leaves are heavier and can strain the strength of the bag.
When it’s full you pull the bag out, spread the leaves out within it, fille up the barrel again and tip it, upside down, spilling the content into the bags.
Rinse and repeat.
When the leaves are dry, it’s best to put them into barrel first then crunch them down with something. I often use my hands but this year got out the plastic bucket that has the metal legs for my drum platform in it. The weight helps with the crushing. Then the leaves got into the bag, which you set aside before filling and crunching down again.
Say, have I shown you my plastic pocket protector with a leaf on it?
There are other finer points: Checking the wind and working with it; judging pile size for bagging efficiency; learning how to act exhausted when your longtime spouse asks how things are going.
But it’s obvious now that I’m stalling – delaying the point at which I confess the illegality.
So here it is.
On a day when there are maybe 25 60-gallon bags curled up in the driveway like mating snakes, my wife, who has a habit of being annoyingly right about everything, tells me that the maximum bag size the city takes is 55 gallons.
I felt like an overloaded trucker being pulled over after visiting an all-you-can-eat buffet.
Because rebagging would have been like recounting 140 million-plus votes, I thought about putting a note on the line of bags confessing to my crime and throwing myself on the city’s mercy.
About then, my wife brought out the 50-pound chill pill and told me to person-up.
Sure enough, when the rooster crowed that Saturday, I heard the roar of a truck, looked out the upstairs bathroom window and watched the truck pull away from a lovely empty space where 42 60-gallon bags had been.
And there I stood, with an illegal smile and thinking of John Prine.