As most of you know, Babci is an avid gardener, so for about 8 months out of the year, she will be out in her yard just about every day that it’s not raining. This week, when I drove up to her house, I found this sapling in the process of being transplanted.
Babci the Smuggler
In case you’re curious, this is a sour cherry tree. She had been asking me to find one for her. Despite my best efforts scouring the web and plant catalogs, I couldn’t find the strain she wanted. When she went to Poland two years ago, she decided to take matters into her own hands. She found one there and smuggled it back in her luggage. On the drive back from the airport, she told me excitedly about her secret cargo. She didn’t have a big bag so I was expecting a tiny little sapling in her suitcase. When she packed it, she somehow managed to soak and bend the branches in a way that she could wrap the tree limb in a U shape in her luggage. When she took the tree out, it sprung open (boy oy oing) into a 6 foot sapling. I can only imagine the words that were exchanged between her and her twin sister while they packed the night before. I think she had 2 other trees in there too, but now I forget what they were. I think a plum and a peach.
Super Strength
In her prime, Babci was super strong. I remember in college when Babci was about 60, I got this big metal teacher’s desk for free that I was trying to get into the house. The thing was crazy heavy. I had 2 college guys trying to lift it up just three steps and they were struggling. One of them weighed at least 220. Babci was standing there watching the whole thing. After several failed attempts, she decides she can’t watch anymore and switches places with one of the guys. She braces herself and heaves the desk onto the landing in one full swoop. It was just incredible that a 5’2 woman could be that crazy strong.
Then about 10 years later, I asked her to help me carry a TV up the stairs. You can imagine my surprise when she began struggling to hold her end up. I had visions of my new TV smashing down the stairs and I’m like “lift the TV woman, what the heck is wrong with you?” Oh yeah, you’re 70. It was sad for me to realize that she was starting to get old and could no longer do the superhuman things she used to do.
The Transition
Today Babci is 77. She still line dries her clothes, mows the lawn, has a huge garden, cooks everything from scratch, mends my kid’s clothes and DIGS UP 8 FOOT SAPLINGS. When I saw this tree partially dug up, I offered to help her pry the roots up (hence the stump in the background). She declined my offer. She said she needed the exercise and she’ll easily get it done without my help. The next day, the tree was in it’s new home and the day after, the hole was covered back up again. Back in her prime, she would have done this in an afternoon after a full day of work, but now it takes her 4 days. On a side note, stubbornness does not seem to decline with age.
I guess it’s a good thing that people have more time in retirement because it takes a whole heck of a lot longer to get stuff done. The good news is that if you’re relatively healthy, you can still do all the things you used to do when you were younger, just at a different pace.
Respect Your Elders
So, my final thought is this. When your grandma or grandpa or any other retired person says “they’re busy” try not to belittle that fact and say “You’re retired, how can you be busy? You’ve got all day to do stuff.” In many cases, it truly takes all day to get through the things they used to be able to do in just a few hours.
This observation that retired people don’t have as much free time as I thought because it takes longer to do things is a major revelation to me. It didn’t register in my mind until I saw the partially dug up sapling. I don’t know how I didn’t see or realize this before now. Is this news to you too or are you more perceptive than I am?
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