Weed Eaters

My neighbor, Leo, by the end of his days, had a 55-gallon drum filled with weed eaters standing on their tiptoes inside it.  Leo kept the drum of weed eaters in his Quonset hut shop.

I remember visiting Leo in his shop some seventeen years before his passing.  At the time, Leo had only three weed eaters.  I had expressed interest in buying a new weed eater for myself.  I sat on the back rack of his four-wheeler as Leo showed his weed eaters. 

“It’s been six months today,” Leo said as the two of us looked over a red weed eater.  “Six months since Elma died.”

Elma.  Leo’s wife.

“I miss her a lot,” he added.

I balanced the red weed eater in my hands for the “feel” of it.  I am never quite sure about the best things to say at such times. 

I looked over to the other two weed eaters.  An orange one.  A green one.  At times like these there are not enough weed eaters.  Not even a barrel filled with them will do.   And their color really doesn’t matter.

— Mitchell Hegman