Saturdays

Saturdays were the best days. Instead of wearing khaki trousers and plaid button up shirts, dad would come down the hall in faded jeans and t-shirt whistling a John Phillips Sousa tune. After completing our list of chores delegated by mom, we worked in the yard. Being a girl, I usually was assigned carport duty and avoided the more laborious chores of the older boys. The driveway ended with a large cement carport in front of a double garage. The cement was prime for rollerblading and shooting hoops into the fiberglass basketball hoop, but needed continuous sweeping from the heavy dust storms that rampaged the area. I was to use a large push broom to clear the carport, and then the regular kitchen broom to get the corners and sides of the house. The weight of the push broom made my feeble arms shake, and I needed frequent rests. It seemed to me this task would take hours, for by the time I cleared a perfect white path on the cement, a burst of wind would come blowing gravel and dirt across my completed work.

The older boys worked on projects. Like building cinder block retaining walls or underground sprinklers. This was harder work. I could tell by the way Drew’s face fell when the command came to turn off their video games and meet dad outside, and the way Dustin grumbled as he put on his worn white sneakers. Sometimes they would disagree about the usefulness of the projects, but dad said he was, “building boys into men, not blocks into walls”.