Why Are You Watching Me?

"It is freezing out here."  I thought, staring down at the yellow and red leaves at my feet.  I was trying to keep warm, but also trying to keep my face dry.  It was a cold, wet, fall day and as I'm looking down at the wet leaves covering the grass.  My brother, who's standing next to me says, "this is stupid."  "I know,"  I say.  "We aren't even doing anything." 

About 20 minutes ago, my father yelled upstairs to us to get dressed because he "needed our help outside."  We got dressed and came outside.  He led us into the garage and lifted this old wooden ladder off the two homemade pegs on the garage wall.  That ladder always looked so darn heavy. It must have been a 32 foot ladder, and probably at least 32 years old.  "Watch it.  This thing is heavy." he'd say as he carried it around the back of the house and stood it up on the grass.  I just kept wondering why he chose such an ugly fall day to do this.  What I realize now, is that he probably wasn't too excited about it either, but he had to do it on one of the only days he had off of work.  Then he attached a yellow, nylon rope to a 5 gallon bucket by making some kind of funny knot on the handle.  We just stood there watching, "doing nothing." 

Then he'd lean the ladder up against the gutter and after a quick tutorial about how to properly use a ladder and how to hold the ladder for another person, he'd start his ascent, bucket in tow.  We then would assume the position, right next to each other, with our feet by the feet of the ladder and our hands holding the ladder up against the house.  We would alternate looking up to see what he's doing, then back down because the rain was falling on our face.  Just as we start to day dream, watching the water drip off our hoods onto our matching, Venture brand gym shoes, he'd interupt us. "Watch it," he'd say, as he lowered the bucket.  We'd look inside and see black decaying leaves, often smelling of wet, rotting yard waste.  We would empty it into the garbage can and he'd hoist it back up again. 

Then, at the moment when we were most bored and most mad at my dad for dragging an 8 and 10 year old out in the cold rain, he'd yell from the top of the ladder, "why are you watching me?"  And we would yell back up with that phrase that we knew he was waiting for, "So that we know how to do it when we get older!" 

Then he would continue to do his thing, raising and lowering the bucket, and every 20 minutes, repeating our dialogue with him.   "Why are you guys watching me?"   "So we know how to do it when we get older." 

"This is stupid,"  I'd whisper.  "Tell me about it,"  says my brother.