push reel

When my brother and I were assigned the task of mowing grandad's lawn, we would usually split the task. One of us would mow the front and sides and one would mow the back. We would often argue about who would get to do the front. The back yard had trees, the swing, usually a lawn table and chairs, the charcoal grill and various other obstacles to mow around or under, or have to move, mow, then move back. The front yard was a large rectangle of grass, unencumbered by obstacles which slow down or redirect a lawn mower, making it much more appealing for the young lad who wishes to finish his assigned task and commence to fiddle farting around.
The front yard was also a more pure mowing experience. Once the slightly irregular area next to the house was done, the remaining almost perfect rectangle could be completed by walking a single line around the outer edges of the rectangle, shaving off a strip until nothing remained. Or one could go back and forth on one edge of the rectangle, mowing long strips on one edge until only a single long strip remained. The adventurous mower might mow diagonally, or even mow in a complicated criss cross bow tie pattern.
Sometimes one of us would mow the entire lawn, while the other worked on something else. One might use the hand trimmer to cut the grass around the flowerbeds and obstacles, and rake up the cut grass after the other one mowed. There might be an extended period of negotiation to determine who would mow, trim, rake and or fertilize which part of the yard. We always kept a running tally of who had done what last time, or at least we pretended to.
While cleaning out the garage one time, we noticed an old push reel mower behind some things up against a wall. Being fascinated by all sorts of tools and machinery, we extracted the dusty old mower and took it out to the lawn. It was extremely hard to push, and didn't cut the grass very well. We put a bunch of oil on it, and it was a bit easier to push, but it still had a tendency to grab the grass and stop instead of cutting if it wasn't going full speed. It was a neat machine though, and fun to play with. We pushed it down the driveway as fast as we could so we could hear the blades whizzing around at high speed. We did actually cut a few strips of grass, but it was too dull to do much without extreme effort.
We told grandad about finding the ancient reel mower and that we thought it was pretty cool. He seemed pleased that we liked it, and announced that we would go and get it sharpened the next day. I think he liked the idea that we might potentially do more work while performing the same task, but he probably suspected that we would push it around a bit more, even if it was sharpened, and get bored of it and go back to the easier gas powered mower.
We took the old reel mower, the blade of the gas mower and the hand trimmer and shears to the place where grandad got things sharpened. It was a few miles away, in a little garage-like building behind a house. When we arrived, an old guy came out of the house to the building and did the sharpening. When we got back, we tried out the freshly sharpened reel mower as soon as we got it out of the car. It was much easier to push, and even going slowly, it cut right through the grass. The lawn could probably have waited another day or two to be mowed, but I decided I'd go ahead and mow the front yard with the reel mower since it had just been sharpened.
I started off at a good clip, confident that I'd finish quickly, now that the mower was oiled and sharpened. It wasn't too long before I slowed down though, realizing that the reel mower, though it was a lot easier to push than when I first tried it, was still significantly harder to push than the gas powered mower. I also noticed that the reel mower was narrower than the powered mower, so I was going to have to do more passes to finish, and I'd have to push it a lot further. It was harder to push, but it was more pleasant in some ways. There was no loud sound of a reciprocating engine, just the whish of the curved blades sliding over the cutting surface. It was nice to watch the cuttings shoot out of the mower and rain down behind it on the freshly cut surface of the grass. The faster the mower was pushed, the higher the cuttings would fly. I also liked the idea that I was doing the whole job without the help of some other power source.
As I got more and more tired I considered giving up, or stopping and coming back later to finish, but the part I had mowed looked nice, and I decided not to let that remaining bit of lawn defeat my intention to mow the whole front. My hands started to get sore, and I felt like I might be getting some blisters, but I kept going. I just kept looking at remaining amount of uncut grass and thinking I'd do at least one more pass. I thought that every time until there was only one more pass left to finish, and then I did one more, and I was done. I pushed the reel mower back towards the garage and stopped when i got to the garage and turned around to survey my work.
I was extremely pleased. The cut seemed so even and sharp. I remember thinking it must have been the first time I thought of a lawn as beautiful. There were no trails of battered grass spit out from a spinning blade, just an even coating of sliced grass. There was no smell of exhaust or oil, only the smell of freshly cut grass. I was very tired, and my hands were sore, but they weren't numbed and buzzing from the vibration of the gasoline engine, and there was no ringing in my ears.
I thought about doing the back yard with the reel mower too. It would have really looked great, but I was much too tired. I thought maybe I'd do it the next day, but then I remembered it wasn't my turn to do the back yard.