ROSIE THE RIVETER, 2.0
Today is the first day of a massive snowfall in Minnesota. I sat in my office just staring at the white-colored veil that was blissfully falling onto our driveway and trees. It was magical. Then, I looked at the time and gasped, “Oh my goodness, I should try and snow blow before Matt gets home!” So I messaged him to ask if that would be a pleasant surprise, thinking that he would say, “No, honey. Don’t worry about it. I can come home from working all day, throw on some more snow gear, go outside with our huge snow blower and trudge through the five inches of snow! Don’t worry about it!” But unfortunately, that was not his response! He jumped and shouted, “OKAY!”
I went and put on my snow boots, fiddled with my earpiece/headset that I conveniently found in the freezer yesterday (story for another time!), and put my gloves on, and away I went. I Googled Hang Out’ed Matthew (facetime for us Android users) and asked him with a big determining smile…. “Now, how do I start this thing?”
I dutifully named her Rosie the Riveter 2.0 because she is red, just like our old riding lawn mower. I don’t know if you remember, but I have had similar experiences with huge machinery, just like this snow blower, and it did not end well. While I was riding her and pretending like I owned a farm and simultaneously dreaming I was on a horse galloping through the pastures, I saw our dog’s rope that we tie him up on so he can do his business outside. I thought Rosie 1.0 could easily clear this two-inch thick rope because the blades were high up or something made up like that! So, I decided to high-ho-silver and run the rope over! OH MY GOD, was I wrong! The rope ended up tearing up in the blade and stopped Rosie in her tracks! Matthew heard the commotion and came running outside and his big brown eyes widened at the sight of his wife on this red chariot with an ensnared rope that just tore through our lawn mower.
Rosie was not the same after that!
So you can imagine what was going through my mind when I asked if I could snow blow our driveway… tehehehe.
He had me turn my phone towards the snow blower and I could hear him loud and clear in my headset as he was pointing to a tortoise and a hare, along with a chu-chu chimney stack and a blow torch thing you have to pull. He also said to push this little button of air to start the thing called the “primer,” but all I thought was to blow air into this little gasket thing. Which, in my mind, was stupid. Based on previous experience, I should not be allowed to go by any electrical, mechanical, or anything handy, basically. But I was bound and determined to get Rosie the Riveter 2.0 going as I was all hopped up on coffee and cocoa, and it was the first snowfall, and by golly, I am a woman, and I bore four kids, and yaddy yaddy yaddy! I pulled on the blow torch handle and waited for it to move, but nothing!
“Matthew,” I said over the phone.
“What?”
“It’s not working. Is there a key I can turn or a button I can push or something?”
“No, Kenzie. It doesn’t work like that!”
“But CAN it?” I asked……
“No, honey.” He says with exasperation. “We didn’t buy something like that. All you need is to pull on the handle a lot harder than what you are currently doing.”
Well, I just worked out two days in a row, yep, you read that correctly. TWO DAYS in a row, I was sore as hell, so pulling or cranking on something made my bones ache. But, because I was mighty determined, I tried it again, and she reverberated into motion.
“Oh shoot Matthew! Now what? How do I make her go?”
He then showed me the agar handle to squeeze (what the hell? I thought that was for ice fishing!) and the go-squeeze one.
Squeezing them both, I let out a huge roar of laughter. I was snow blowing!
Things I learned while I experienced 5 minutes with Rosie the Riveter 2.0:
Make sure the button closest to the tortoise is checked so it goes faster
Make sure the chimney shoot is not launching onto your neighbor’s lawn
Make sure the chimney shoot is not launching onto the spot you just cleared as you try and back up
Make sure the chimney shoot is not launching onto one of your vehicles, which then leads to scrapping off said vehicle even more than you would have had to
Figure out how to back up
Grow five inches taller so you can have a better radius on the turning
Gain 20 pounds so I can have enough leverage to turn it
Make sure the gas tank is filled before I start it (smacks forehead)
I texted Matthew, saying that she had stopped, and he asked me to crank on the handle again. Yeah, right, Matthew! I responded with, “eh, I’m done. You can finish when you get home!”
It is exactly like our relationship. I am all gung-ho about starting something, getting super excited, and getting everything in order and ready. Then, I try to do it, completely fumble and laugh at myself, and then call Matthew and say, “Okay…. I’m done……. Can you finish this now?” And more often than not, there is also a phrase of “I think I broke something while doing this. Can you fix it?”
I tried to figure out WWMD…. What Would Matthew Do about maneuvering the chimney shoot off of snow into the neighbors’ lawn and such and for the life of me, I couldn’t figure it out. If you crank it too far one way, then it just ends up going back on the driveway, and if you crank it the other, it ends up in theirs. I swear…. I cannot figure out!
There has to be an easier way! Oh that’s right… in true Wilcox fashion.. Hire it out!
As I am writing this, I can hear the roar of Rosie once again.
Ohhh, sweet success! Matthew is finishing it up, once again.