First time mowing on a riding mower!

I remember Grandpa Cox being parked in the drive way of our house when the school bus would pull up.  He would show up on Friday afternoon’s and pick me up.  He would secretly call my Dad(Carl) the night before.  He did this about every other weekend.  I would run straight over to the car, except he would be in the house,  I would then run in the door yelling, “GRANDPA ARE YOU READY TO GO”.  Mom would always make us change out of our school clothes before we did anything.  I would not only change my clothes but I would also come out of my bedroom with my packed bag.  Cara Leta would never go, and Cassie wasn’t born until 1974.  So I thought it was GREAT!!  Every weekend that I got to go Grandpa’s he would mow his yard.  He would let me ride with him.  Then he got nervy and one day he let me mow.  This was out at the Cornstalk house.  Dad would always call when he got home from work on Friday night and say that he would pick me up on Saturday.  But if Dad had to do a side job I knew I wasn’t going home until after the big family dinner that Grandma would make on Sunday.  Anyway, I thought, “OH BOY!! I get to mow”.  Of course, Grandpa’s mower had the old clutch, so I would kill it when I would take off, so he would get it going and hop off.  This was my very first time mowing by myself.  Well, I would get done mowing, park the mower up by the house and run inside.  Grandpa and I would sit down on the couch and watch roller derby.  Grandma Goldie would sit there with us.  We always ended up playing a game of Sorry.  Well, Grandpa took the cellophane off of something.  I don’t remember what, but anyway he gave it to me and told me to go throw away the trash he had in his hand.  So I took it and threw it away.  I came skipping back into the room and grandpa looked at me real funny.  I said what are you looking at?  He said did you throw that away?  I said yes that’s what you told me to do.  He just started laughing.  He said you better go look again.  So I went running back in the kitchen and looked in the trash can.  Low and behold there was a $5.00 bill laying in the trash can.  WOW!!  I GOT PAID FOR MOWING GRANDPA’S YARD.  He thought that was hilarious.  So everytime I mow even now that I am 44 years old, I think of him and smile.