Yep, I remember back when this was all fields.
Well, it’s still a field now but a few years back it was more field-ish, you know what I mean? The grass was greener back then, it had a certain windsweptedness about it that a better word would probably sum up really well. I don’t know, I’m not one for colourful language–cept when swearing’s involved mind–so it’s hard to put this into the way that I’m thinking…have you ever stood somewhere, looked off into the distance and just wanted to start running towards the horizon? Like it’s way off, a blurred line of nothing but grass and sky, and all you want to do is leg it until maybe even the distance consumes you? Ha sorry to ramble; I did say I wasn’t too good with words didn’t I?
All the blokes back at the council call this the green lake.
So, as you can tell, it’s not very lake shaped but keep in mind that it was named after Authur Lake–Pronounced La-key: his family weren’t much for schooling and apparently they distrusted the letter y for some reason–well he was the bloke who originally owned this paddock back in 2001 or so.
Yep, old Arthur set off with nothing but a victa mower, two full jerrycans of petrol and half a longneck of Balendup Bitter.
Word was that the old bugger had finally had enough of the misses’ nagging so he set off to mow his two-hundred acre front lawn. Makes sense too, I remember Arty as one of those blokes who would set his mind to a task and see that it was gotten done lest any mug in his way lose a limb or bear themselves a child.
Anyway, Arthur Lake starts mowing and after a bit he realises that it’s near noon and it’s starting to get as hot as a mudgee kettle; he switches off the mower, drops his dacks and then vanishes into thin air.
There’s a few different theories about what happened to Arthur.
Martin, the publican–real shifty bloke, you’ll know him when ya eyeball him–said that he heard Atry fell through a hole in the earth and was working as a penguin catcher down in Antartica or something like that. He said that most bartenders know a thing or two about stuff like this, says it’s some sort of shared apathyor tele-what-have-you, doesn’t matter; he’s full of it.
I reckon what really happened was he’s just scarpered off to the highway and caught a lift with one of the passing B-doubles.
Right anyway, so Authur goes missing and the troopers all waltz out to only claim that he must have gone swimming and been caught in a rip, standard missing persons stuff happens all the time. After a bit of a poke around and a cup of tea they give up and say they’ll build a lifeguard tower in his honor.
You know I always found it odd. Old mate goes missing, gets a memorial, and then everyone starts taking the plaque as literal. We still know the bloke’s alive, I saw him drinking at the Northern Royal last week, but for some reason people have the hardest time divorcing a sign–one that no one seems to have actually read–from reality. People come out here to go boating…How!?
What do you do with a lake then? Can’t keep cows on it anymore, so they had to be moved; gotta make sure the water is certified, so Nevil comes out and splashes some chlorine about every so often; I suppose it makes sense if your eyes are closed.
When people just blindly try to do the right thing, stuff like this happens. Like, if you don’t think too hard about anything you probably would start to look after the lake, you may even be thick enough to sponsor the rowing team’s trip down to the state championships in Sydney. That’s how things work these days, we chuck dollars at it until people leave us alone, it’s all nonsense.
So anyway, don’t laugh but today we’re going to be dredging the lake.
I can see that you’re looking at me like I’m spinning a yarn and I don’t blame ya; It doesn’t bloody make a whole lot of sense dredging a lake with a lawnmower. Well, look. I’m just a greenskeeper, so if you have any questions save em’ for a marine scientist or better yet ask your English teacher.
Oh, I should also say you’ll have to keep an eye out for any ghosts or the other whatcha call ems, shaggy fellas, got two horns…Bugger it, just follow my tractor, mow the lawn, and don’t run over anything that starts with the letter G.
Last thing to know is that high tide is around noon so we’ll have lunch round then–looks a good day for a bit of a fish.
Jacob McCray
2020
Sunday Short Stories 