It's true, we don't hire out housework and lawn chores to others, and so, on occasion, there's nothing to do but get in there and get it done.
Good news though, after rising, reading and exercising I weighed in at 170 1/2 -- we'll see if the extended exercises will keep working their magic.
But then it was off to the back yard -- weeding flower beds, cutting grass and putting down lawn lime, as the rest of the lawn, front and sides, have been treated. I bought a small chain saw last year but had a devil of a time getting it to work after the first time using it. I got it out and did manage to get it started and keep it going -- unfortunately the chain didn't engage properly so there's more research to do on it before I can use it to cut some stumps. I went on the Internet in the evening and found some descriptive information about my make and model of chainsaw, so I have something to go on.
Returning to the house it was upstairs to my garret where unsorted papers awaited; I emerged after 1 a.m. not exactly triumphant, but a little more organized than the day before!
Not that my toiling outside or indoors is of any great physical exertion, but it does put me in mind of a poem that my favorite high school teacher, Raymond J. Rodrigues, a half-Portuguese, half-Russian young man born in New Jersey with whom I studied literature and creative writing , read to us once with great dramatic flair. The poem was written by the Englishman Thomas Hood (1789-1845) and is entitled:
The Song of the Shirt
With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread--
Stitch! stitch! stitch!
In poverty, hunger, and dirt,
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch
She sang the "Song of the Shirt."
"Work! work! work!
While the cock is crowing aloof!
And work — work — work,
Till the stars shine through the roof!
It's Oh! to be a slave
Along with the barbarous Turk,
Where woman has never a soul to save,
If this is Christian work!
"Work — work — work
Till the brain begins to swim;
Work — work — work
Till the eyes are heavy and dim!
Seam, and gusset, and band,
Band, and gusset, and seam,
Till over the buttons I fall asleep,
And sew them on in a dream!
"Oh, Men, with Sisters dear!
Oh, Men, with Mothers and Wives!
It is not linen you're wearing out,
But human creatures' lives!
Stitch — stitch — stitch,
In poverty, hunger, and dirt,
Sewing at once with a double thread,
A Shroud as well as a Shirt.
But why do I talk of Death?
That Phantom of grisly bone,
I hardly fear its terrible shape,
It seems so like my own —
It seems so like my own,
Because of the fasts I keep;
Oh, God! that bread should be so dear,
And flesh and blood so cheap!
"Work — work — work!
My Labour never flags;
And what are its wages? A bed of straw,
A crust of bread — and rags.
That shatter'd roof — and this naked floor —
A table — a broken chair —
And a wall so blank, my shadow I thank
For sometimes falling there!
"Work — work — work!
From weary chime to chime,
Work — work — work!
As prisoners work for crime!
Band, and gusset, and seam,
Seam, and gusset, and band,
Till the heart is sick, and the brain benumb'd,
As well as the weary hand.
"Work — work — work,
In the dull December light,
And work — work — work,
When the weather is warm and bright —
While underneath the eaves
The brooding swallows cling
As if to show me their sunny backs
And twit me with the spring.
Oh! but to breathe the breath
Of the cowslip and primrose sweet —
With the sky above my head,
And the grass beneath my feet
For only one short hour
To feel as I used to feel,
Before I knew the woes of want
And the walk that costs a meal!
Oh! but for one short hour!
A respite however brief!
No blessed leisure for Love or Hope,
But only time for Grief!
A little weeping would ease my heart,
But in their briny bed
My tears must stop, for every drop
Hinders needle and thread!"
With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread —
Stitch! stitch! stitch!
In poverty, hunger, and dirt,
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch, —
Would that its tone could reach the Rich! —
She sang this "Song of the Shirt!"
***
When I lived in Germany (1970-1978) I picked up a book published before World War I which documented in pictures the lives of ordinary villagers from the Odenwald area (roughly north of Heidelberg and south of the city of Darmstadt). This lady from the village of Rohrbach was probably not quite so desperate as Thomas Hood's woman, but hard work has no boundaries.
Probably should have saved this posting for Labor Day!
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