2102. Enough to make you sickle

When will the rain stop? Sabrina gazed out the window and sighed. The summer school break was about to begin. She had enough problems finding things for Travis to do when the sun was shining. But a summer of rain? Goodness.

Travis was a boy who liked his own company. He wasn’t forever going and playing with friends. He liked to do things on his own, such as mowing the lawn and picking fruit. He liked fixing things and working out how things worked.

Sabrina was not keen that he spend all his summer time sitting at the computer. And there it was; the summer break had begun! And rain, rain, rain.

Was that a break in the clouds? “Why don’t you mow the lawn even though the grass is wet?” suggested Sabrina. So he did, and after half an hour the lawn mower died.

Rising to the challenge Travis purchased an old sickle. He read on line how to use it safely – with a sweeping arm motion away from the body. Before long he got the knack of it. Rain or not, he couldn’t wait for the grass to grow! The place was a picture.

“How do you manage, with all this rain,” asked many a passer-by, “to keep your place so tidy?”

“Travis uses a sickle,” said Sabrina proudly.

It wasn’t long before someone reported Sabrina for allowing her son to use a dangerous implement. Social Services called. Such irresponsibility trusting a boy with a hazardous sickle.

Yeah, like a motor mower is any safer.