HOT PURSUIT
After years of cutting lawn with a push mower, I have enjoyed zipping around my yard with a John Deere riding lawn mower for the past two summers.
I had begged for years to get a riding mower, but no one seemed to listen. I know I pushed my kids to the point of annoyance as they had to be sick of hearing me wanting such a backyard beast.
I actually didn’t mind the workout I got from a push mower, but I always struggled to find the time to mow, which usually took a minimum of three hours. And I’m one that wants to get everything done in one shot rather than stopping and coming back to it over multiple times or days.
A few weekends ago I found myself questioning why I ever wanted a riding mower in the first place. And thanking my lucky stars that I didn’t get seriously injured.
To set the stage, my yard is hilly with steep slopes in numerous areas. The yard has some steep inclines that seem even difficult to walk up. It’s tricky, at best, to successfully mow.
And boy did I ever find that out the hard way.
As I was making a pass on one of the steep inclines mowing sideways, my weight shifted to one side, and I suddenly felt the mower tipping to the point of no return. Before I knew it, I was flying off into the air and the mower rolled over, landing upright at the bottom of the hill. Luckily, I made a mad dash away from the machine to avoid getting pinned.
It reminded me of a crazy roller coaster ride gone awry at an amusement park.
Not only did I underestimate the slope of my yard, but I also made the cardinal mistake of operating the mower sideways, instead of up and down the slopes.
Dazed and stunned by what had just happened, I quickly regained my wits and counted my blessings that I survived the slope attack by being able to walk around without any injuries. Of course, that's not saying much for my pride and bruised ego.
From what I can tell, the mower survived the dramatic rollover without any problems, and I was back to mowing again within minutes.
Getting thrown off the lawn mower brought me flashbacks to my childhood years of growing up on the farm. When I was about 10 years old, I was helping my parents pick rocks from the field. We had a large hole in the woods where we dumped the rocks from the bucket on the skid steer. It was a John Deere no less.
I was operating the skid loader, raised the bucket to dump the large rocks into the hole. The only problem was I raised the bucket way too high and suddenly the skid went flying into the hole with me still in it. Horrified at what took place, I stumbled out of the hole with a hole of my own on the top of my head requiring a trip to the doctor to stitch things up.
After the shock wore off, I found myself realizing how extremely lucky I was that something worse didn’t happen to me.
Life is always full of adventures. But tipping over in John Deeres isn’t one that I want to come across again.
I’ll be in hot pursuit of mowing down the slopes of my backyard just a tad more cautiously than ever before without operating sideways. It never hurts to being overcareful.