Can I Get My Stuff Back?

Saturday night

I had recently moved into a new home, but many of my things remained at my old house, which had been bought by a young family with two small children. I went back there to retrieve some of my possessions, and found several of my stereo components in a new cabinet on the side porch, along with three full shelves of my L.P.'s. My speakers were out there, too, accompanied by a row of my books about rock and roll. The young wife found me there, staring at it all. She said, "Do you have to take them right now? It's such a great library, and my husband enjoys reading about the records while he listens to them."

I walked out into the backyard and found the large, red plastic tub that I used to store sports equipment. Some of my bats, balls and Frizbees were strewn about, so I began to gather them up. I stuck a few Wiffle bats into the tub, and the new owners' youngest boy popped his head up and grinned at me. He had been hiding in there.

I noticed that one of the pine trees in my old garden had died, so I decided to cut it down. But before I did that, at the very least, I could save some of the bark for the garden path. I got out my ax, and began chipping it away. Just then, one of the young woman's relatives walked out of the house, and came over to talk to me. It was Senator Ted Kennedy. He said, "I'm sorry about your tree, but I'm glad you're saving the bark for the mulch. We use it at our home down in Florider."

*****

Our nieces and nephews visited us here in Nashville for Thanksgiving, so I pulled our red plastic tub out of the shed, and we had sports equipment scattered all over the yard. Of course, those few days made every bit of work on the backyard worthwhile.

My wife and I watched "This Old House" and "Ask This Old House" on PBS yesterday afternoon. Many of the guys featured on those shows have thick Boston accents; I'm sure that's why I thought of Ted Kennedy. One of the segments of the second show featured a young family (with two children) who were spreading mulch in their backyard so that their kids would have a safe place to play. (There wasn't enough sunlight to get much grass to grow back there.)

The Kennedys owned a compound in Palm Beach, which, for a time, was known as "The Florida White House."