The Buzz Of Destiny (2)

            I’m here to tell you, you haven’t lived until you’ve mown a lawn on a hot, sunny day with a flea singing in your ear. There was a longing, a confirmed existence coming through in his voice. Of course, he did some scatting also, but, sadly, it wouldn’t translate through writing.

            I began to shave the side of the sidewalk with the mower, and Flea continued to hum on the theme.

            Then, like my blood, the plot thickened.

            He wore a black “Under Armor” cap, sleek, and tight-fitting. The design of the cap, I thought, made it look like it was trying to be too many things at once. Now, the man himself had been, and was, going places. He hadn’t just been to the typical tourist spots. He had been to their suburbs. Right now, he was walking toward me on the sidewalk I was mowing beside.

            I found it odd that he was walking down a basically empty sidewalk wearing a face mask. But, it was the spring of 2020. I’d seen it before, and Mask can only mean Good. I stopped the mower, pushed it a bit further into the yard, and stood next to it, giving him space to pass. Meanwhile, Flea had something to say:

            “Whatever he says, say ‘Yes’. Trust me.”

            A flea that had gotten in my ear for no good reason, and wouldn’t leave, was asking me to trust him.

            The man looked at me as he passed. Then he stopped, pointed at the mower and asked:

            “Is that a Lexus?”

            And, I said- “Yes!”

            There was a thin, screechy laugh in my ear. That pesky flea!

            The man looked perplexed, and all I’d done was agree with his premise. The mower sat with its teeny-tiny headlights glowing. It really is a nice mower. Flea continued to laugh. High-pitched. Saying,

            “Now you can tell him that you were just shitting him. The poor schmuck!”

            And, that I did. I told the guy that I’m always willing to claim to own a Lexus, but that the mower was actually a ‘Ryobi’.

            Although the man was closer to me than he ever would be (through his own volition!) he took his mask off. For emphasis! And said-

“They make electric mowers, you know.”

            “I know.” I told the man, speaking through the gleeful buzz in my ear and patting the handle of the mower beside me. “This is one.”

            The man could not believe what he was hearing. He said, “Never mind,” put his mask back on, and sauntered, shoulders clenched, down the sidewalk. And, the tinny, chuckling narrative continued in my left ear.

            “That was totally worth it! My work here is done.”

And, with that, Flea was gone.

            What the man was going on about, I’ll never know. I blame that cap.

            I wonder where Flea is now. I learned a lot from him. I never thought that I would say that having a flea in my ear was a positive experience.

            As I finished up mowing, I pondered that perhaps they should make a monument to him.

            But, to what scale? Lifesize? Could Fabergé take on that task? Then, would park or museum staff give visitors magnifying glasses, the better to experience the phenomenon that is Flea?

            Nah. Any statue of Flea would have to be larger than Flea actually is. Flea is larger than life anyway. I think that he deserves a statue. But if, through necessity, the statue was larger than he really is, it would probably wind up looking very creepy.