The lawn mower incident

When we celebrated Noah's first Gotcha Day (May 11, 2003), Mike's parents bought him a toy lawn mower.  It was love at first sight, and he's loved it for the last seven years.  Even two days ago, he was doubled over, pushing the way-too-small-for-him mower over the grass.  I didn't even see the ridiculousness of it, but Mike must have, because he threw it away.  Noah and I happened to be standing at the window when the garbage truck came this morning, so we had a clear view of the mower being dumped into the truck.  It was a disturbing sight, but not as disturbing as the one that immediately followed:  me running down the street with no bra, chasing the garbage truck.  By the time I caught it, the mower had already been crushed, and the garbage man scoffed at me.

I called Mike and demanded to know why he had done it, and he reasonably said that it was too small for both kids now.  I was mad about a perfectly good toy taking up space in the landfill when we could have given it to someone else.  I was mad at Mike for not discussing it with us.  I was mad that I had to explain it to Noah, even though he wasn't as disturbed as I was. He just said that he wished he could have given it to Holden (a neighbor kid).  I said, "We all make mistakes sometimes, and this time Daddy made a mistake, and we just have to forgive him for it."  Noah said ok and moved on.  I was the one who couldn't stop thinking about it.

I got in the shower, and as I stood under the water, memories of Noah and the mower flooded my mind.  Baby Noah in the front pack strapped to me, intently watching Mike mow, and crying if I took him inside. One-year-old Noah on his very special day, the first time he saw his own mower all shiny and new.  Toddler Noah wearing only a diaper and proudly "mowing" right alongside his daddy.  The way he used to say "see Daddy mow-mow" in his cute little voice.  Noah's little mower parked right next to Daddy's in the shed.  Suddenly I started sobbing and continued through the whole shower.  I realized that I wasn't mad about the loss of the mower; I was mourning the loss of my sweet little boy, who has now become a rather surly tween.