My father arrived here around 1 pm yesterday, and from 1 to 5 pm we worked hard, loading his pickup with all the debris from February's ice storm.

Through it all I was worried about my dad, age 76, overdoing it, because he really has become very sedentary due to hip and back problems. But you can't tell my dad what to do; my strategy, as I mentioned in previous posts, was to do as much of the work as I possibly could before he came up, and then once he was here, to make sure I held up my end so that all the heavy work didn't fall on him alone. He expressed surprise at how much debris I had accumulated in the driveway when he arrived. It's like a forest, he said, I couldn't see the house.

When he was chainsawing the logs, i was scurrying back and forth with the wheelbarrow, toting 2 or 3 log chunks at a time, over to the driveway. He kept telling me to slow down, but really, I wanted to take as much of the work off of him. And here he was just trying to help me.

I was going to spray his pants with Off because the ticks are out now. It was exactly this time of year when i was relishing all the yard work, bug-free and no foliage out yet, when I got Lyme Disease. He doesn't take it that seriously cus it's not as epidemic in New Jersey as it is here in Connecticut. But he was out there chainsawing before I had a chance to spray his pants legs.

So I implemented "Plan B." When we were all done Friday, I told him to take his pants off, in fact, to take all his clothes off, in the basement, and throw them in the washing machine, where I'd already thrown my clothes. I was surprised he didn't dismiss my admittedly paranoid concerns; he threw his clothes in there. But hey, if you walk through my yard, you'll step on deer poop every six feet, no exaggeration.

Running the clothes through a washing machine cycle doesn't actually kill any ticks that might be on there. (At this time of year, they're in the nymph stage and are the size of a dot on this screen...you'd never see them.) What does kill them is running them through the dryer. Ticks thrive in damp, moist habitat, like under decaying leaves; dry heat will kill them.

We also had to make a quick side trip to the hardware store to get chainsaw oil. We filled the pickup bed to the very top. In all, we made 4 trips to the landfill; in the last trip there, we brought the heaviest, largest stumps, and I asked the guy at the dump how much I'd need to pay. (Anything over 4 inches in diameter, they charge you.)

I'd like to say I flashed my winning smile and he said "no charge," but actually, he was just a real nice guy. (They all are over there.) And he said, "Don't worry about it." Pine chips more easily and it's not a big deal, he said, even though I had a dozen large stumps. Hardwoods are more problematic, I guess.

Anyway, in between all the very hard work, we had plenty of time to talk. Over breakfast, my dad startled me by asking me if I knew that my grandparents had purchased three extra burial plots for us. I'm not sure if they intended them for my dad, me and my sister, because I would think they'd assume my sister and I would get married and perhaps end up somewhere else, but who knows.

But what a strange feeling it was to hear this bit of news. It was as if my late grandparents, dead these many years, had reached out beyond the grave to extend one last act of kindness.

I told him I'd had no idea about those extra burial plots but truth be told, it was a comforting thought to know that if i wanted, i could choose to be buried alongside my grandparents.

I hadn't even known where my grandparents are buried. That may strike you as strange. I have never visited the cemetery. My dad informed me they are in Paramus, New Jersey. My grandfather died when I was 16. My grandmother outlived him by nearly 25 years, but when she died, my dad told me she did not want a wake or funeral, she just wanted to be buried, so my dad was the only person at the burial. I thought it very sad at the time, because perhaps she didn't realize she was depriving her family of the chance to grieve for her, at least in the traditional way that families do.

Once my dad left around noon, i stripped the bedsheets off the bed my dad slept in and ran all that through the washer and dryer as well. You can't be too careful.

I was quite miffed (!) that my new cat, Luther, chose to spend most of the night in my comfortable bed with my dad rather than with me, on the floor of my office. Well!

All in all, it was a productive day-and-a-half, and I'm glad i got all that taken care of. Now I can focus on readying my vegetable garden for the new season. First order of business before anything else is erecting a new fence around it.