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  • From: "TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] Grandpa's justice
  • Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2007 20:38:40 -0600


Grandpa's justice
By Tom Kovach
http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles/kovach65.html

Having the best vegetable garden in the village might put food on the table
and make some money at the market, but it also can cause some problems. Or
so it was with my grandfather, the mayor of a small village in Hungary,
then a part of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire.

My father told me Grandfather grew some of the best potatoes, cabbage, and
carrots in the area. But one summer he ran into problems. Someone was
stealing his produce. Not just stealing it, but also digging some of the
plants up and leaving them to spoil.

Besides his huge vegetable garden, my grandfather had the duties of mayor,
taking care of local disputes and such. He also had some cows, horses, and
hay fields to care for. My grandmother helped and so did some of the
children who were older, but for the most part the work fell on my
grandfather and he was none too pleased to see his hard work being ruined
by thieves and vandals.

One of the people taking vegetables was an old man who lived in a little
shack and no means of support, other than odd jobs. What little money he
made, he spent on drink. My father did not begrudge him the few vegetables
he took, but he felt bad that the old man was spending the money he made
from the vegetable garden on liquor.

He also knew that the old man was not a vandal. He took whatever vegetables
he got out of the garden to either eat or sell. Someone else was tearing up
the garden.

He got an idea. One day he told my grandmother, “I think I’ll hire the
old man who’s taking my vegetables as a night watchman for our garden.
I’m too busy to stay up watching it.”

My grandmother shook her head, “But can we afford it?”

“I won’t pay him too much. And what we save from his keeping our
vegetables from being taken or ruined will more than make up for what I pay
him.”

My grandmother agreed. “And maybe a job will change him.”

My grandfather smiled, “That’s what I was thinking. In fact I think
this will work out very well.”

When he first approached the old man about a job watching the vegetable
garden, his eyes got big and he looked frightened. No doubt he was afraid
my grandfather knew he was taking some of the vegetables. But he agreed to
the job.

The very first night on the job the old man caught the ones who were
ripping up the garden. They were two young boys whose father had died in
war and were being raised by their widowed mother. They were an unruly lot
and not much older than my father. My grandfather felt sorry for them but
knew that he must do something. Not only were they wrecking his garden but,
since he was mayor, he must also mete out some sort of justice.

“I’ll tell you what,” he told the two wild brothers, “I will show
you how hard it is to grow a nice, big garden, but I will also show you how
enjoyable it can be.”

The boys had no choice but to work in grandfather’s garden. But he also
taught them how to garden. How to plant the seeds, how to carefully water
everything. He even taught them how to care for fruit trees.

At first the boys were angry and spiteful. But they changed their minds
when grandfather also paid them a small amount for their labors. Then he
let them take fruit and vegetables home to their widowed mother. Soon the
boys were anxious to come to work. They felt proud of what they were
learning and my grandfather took his mules over to their mother’s small
plot of land and helped them plant their own garden.

Meanwhile, the old man my grandfather had hired to watch over the garden
was still on the job. Now that he had to “work” at night, he did not
care to drink so much during the day. And, as with the two boys, my
grandfather gave the old man produce to take home each day for his own use.
And a change came over him. He started to feel proud that he had a job and
he started to take care of himself. In fact, he took some of the money my
grandfather paid him and bought himself a new white shirt. The next Sunday
he showed up in church, clean-shaven, with his new shirt proudly buttoned
up, and he was sober.

With the boys helping him in the garden, my grandfather made the garden
even bigger, thereby having more vegetables to sell and therefore having
more money from the sale of the produce. With this he helped the boys buy
seed and fruit trees for their own lot. Before long they were doing very
well in their own garden and selling produce to help their widowed mother.

With the extra money my grandfather decided to fix up a nice clean room in
one of his outbuildings where the old man could live safely and
comfortably. He still paid him to work for him, but by now he didn’t need
a night watchman for the garden. Instead he paid him for odd jobs so that
he could always have some of his own money.

He began eating his meals with my grandfather and grandmother and their
family. In fact he stayed with them until he passed away. He also gave up
drinking for good.

So with just a few extra cents, my grandfather helped the two boys and the
old man help themselves, and he changed the lives of a lot of people
including my grandfather’s and my father’s, who told the story to me.






  • [Livingontheland] Grandpa's justice, TradingPostPaul, 07/20/2007

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