Tristan and the Excavator

I find out things in this time of the virus through impromptu street visits with neighbors I used to merely wave at from my car as I came and went. This is how I came to know the story of Tristan and Jimmy, the Excavator Driver.

The day this story happened was during the pandemic.  It was another bonus day, but this one really no kidding.  Bonus because it is real.  Bonus because it is a surprise profound connection.  Bonus because I was present and not in a hurry or distracted by many errands and important conference calls.

It involved the luck of stepping out to the street to get ready for the trash collectors who come every Wednesday for the trash and every other Wednesday for the trash and the recycle. Gray bin for trash, green one for recycles.  

Bonus because it was Tuesday, get ready for the trash collection day.

Also, there is yard waste pickup except not during the virus. Since forever ago, they stopped collecting all of our prunings and bags of leaves. It was good news when they announced they would restart collection. Good news, but somehow, they petered out and we were loaded up with yard waste at the sides of our streets.   Limbs, leaves, sticks all piled up. Two months’ worth of yard waste sitting there. 

That’s when I got the fire pit idea. I could gradually load my wheelbarrow and bring the yard waste around for an evening fire in the backyard fire pit and sit and watch it with a glass of  red wine.  

I live alone and enjoy these nightly fires and meditations. Maybe sitting with a novel and a flashlight on my book. Looking up, watching the fire. Enjoying this sweet moment in the evening.  Sometimes listening to a dharma talk from Plum Village on my iPhone. Or listening to a zoom choir sing “Hallelujah”, Handel’s or Leonard Cohen.  My evening ritual.

Lately it has been cold, so I wrap up in a blanket.

I was outside explaining this to my neighbor Palmer and collecting some of his short limbs, sticks and leaves, having already burned mine the night before.

We were talking about the plan and gathering his sticks into the wheelbarrow when Tristan and his brother Stefan showed up to visit.  Both in their 20s. 

Tristan enthusiastically told us, while pointing down the street near the traffic light at Park Road, that “This is their last day; they are leaving!”  We looked down the road at the lot where the house at the light had been torn down and the excavator was leveling the lot to get ready for two new houses.  

Tristan is a hugger and homeschooled. He loves his big brother Stefan. He isn’t allowed to go to the construction site alone. He shifts from foot to foot with his arms folded to help him remember that he can’t hug anyone during this social distancing. 

We loved the minute this family moved to the neighborhood and invited us to come to the “welcome to the neighborhood” party. They had a food truck on the street at the end of their driveway and drinks in coolers on their porch. I didn’t know them but went because of the flyer in my door.

I walked up the driveway to introduce myself and Tristan gave me a big ol’ unembarrassed sweet full hug and asked me to come inside and see his room and his sports memorabilia although I think he called it stuff.

His mom explained his brain malformation, called smooth brain.  His language is good.  His motor skills are good enough to run and play catch with his older brother, Stefan.   We immediately connected because we had William my grandson who lived for 8 years with an energy disease.  At first there is worry and sadness that turns into the blessing of having a special needs child in your family.  So much love, so much self-expression and delight along with the seizures and other issues that scare the daylights out of you.

Nobody could have told us  how wide open and big our hearts would get.  We miss Tristan’s hugs right now. That’s what we miss during this pandemic. And we miss William’s cooing, gone forever except for our videos of him. William didn’t have the muscle tone or strength for hugging.

“This is their last day, they are leaving!”  

Tristan and Stefan explained to Palmer and me that Jimmy, the excavator driver, had let Tristan climb up into the excavator and even operate it. 

Stefan showed us the photograph and video on his phone of the event.  He got to move the digger scooper thing up and down. Running the machine with Jimmy standing up on the big tire next to the cab of the giant machine. Up and down. Moving the levers. 

Tristan has had lots of best days in his life given how enthusiastic and lit up he is about life. I think this may have been one. 

Two weeks earlier, Stefan’s band had played on the front porch.   Stefan on guitar and there was someone on drums and someone on keyboard.  They sounded like Pat Matheny.  When I told him that, he said they both went to the same school, Berklee College of Music.  His band, the QuiltTop, which is surely another story, played for 2 hours while the neighborhood milled around keeping our distance, bringing our own drinks and putting money in the tip jar.  Lots of twenty-dollar bills.  

Palmer was there.  Tristan was there grinning, not hugging.  And I ran into some old friends I hadn’t seen in forever who live on the street and we talked about what we are watching on Netflix.  

Caroline came down and I gave her a bag of cedar balls to pack around her wedding dress from the wedding 50 years ago. I had been there several weeks ago to see her dress and she could actually get in it.

She made coffee.  I brought lemon pound cake.  Nell brought flowers and Caroline held them and walked down the hall in her dress and kissed her husband, Roger.  And son Matt found Purcell’s Trumpet Voluntary on his phone and played it as she walked.  Grinning big.  I wished we had had rice or rose petals to throw.

So all that happened in the neighborhood before the excavator bonus day.

Jimmy has texted Tristan and Stefan to let them know where his next demo job is, Stefan or Mama Lisa will take him, and the joy goes on.

Oh and the city sent the yard waste people to get our stuff, so I am on a break from my firepit.

Make a joyful noise to the Lord all ye lands.

Serve the Lord with gladness and good moods of hugging and climbing in excavators.

Come before his presence with singing and playing music on front porches.

Have tip jars for the musicians, making the joyful noise as cars pull over and stop.

Sit in the back yard, hear the music from two doors down.

Watch the fire, wrapped up with a blanket, sing Hallelujah.

Filled with joy and gratitude for this day.

We could all be like Tristan.

Each day the best bonus day ever.