Ten Bucks is Ten Bucks, pt.1

You can put being broke while in college right up there with death and taxes as far as sure things go. I definitely lived the life of a poor college student my first two years of school. I wanted a car nicer than my rusted out ‘76 El Camino. I wanted nice clothes. I wanted to take my girlfriend to nice restaurants and get good seats at concerts and sporting events.

I tried fast food jobs. I gave maintenance at school a shot. I was a lifeguard for a summer. None of them brought the income my 21-year-old self required.

One day after class, I saw a flyer hanging on the message board in the student union building. Somebody was looking for a college kid to cut grass for the summer. Twice a week. Lawnmower and gas supplied. Small yard. $20 per cut. Estimated time to complete- 60 minutes.

$20 an hour sure beat the $3 an hour I was currently making busing tables. I called the number on the flyer and chatted very briefly with a pleasant, upbeat woman. She explained that she was rehabbing a knee after an injury and was taking the year off from mowing the lawn. She wanted to know if I had ever cut grass. The job was mine as soon as I said yes.

Wednesdays after class and on Saturday mornings, I rode my bike to Amy’s house. Same routine each time: Amy and I chit-chatted for a few minutes, she set a pitcher of lemonade on her patio table and I quickly got to mowing. Afterward, I returned to the patio and chugged a couple of glasses of lemonade. There was also an envelope with my pay on the table.

I guessed Amy was in her 50s if not early 60s. She was tall and beautiful with big blue eyes and shoulder length gray hair she wore in a ponytail.

Amy was always good about paying. I never checked the envelope until I got home. Most times, I found the agreed upon $20. Other times I found an extra $10. I appreciated the tip, but I never quite knew why it happened. I had once casually asked if she liked my work. She assured me that the yard was always perfect, so I didn’t think the extra money was a reflection of my work.

After a couple of more weeks, I thought I had figured out Amy’s pay scale. It seemed the extra money was given on days when it was especially hot and humid. Pretty nice gesture, I thought. We never discussed it.

One Saturday was an especially cool day for late June. Temps had been in the 90s for a couple of weeks, but that day was a beautiful mild day. The high temp was only supposed to be in the 70s.

I was almost ready to mow when I noticed I had spilled some gas on my shirt. I didn’t want that on my skin, and I’m not the biggest fan of the smell. I ditched the shirt even though it wasn’t hot at all and proceeded as usual.

I discovered an extra $10 in the envelope when I got home. That shot my pay scale theory about hot days. I remembered I left my gas-soaked t-shirt at Amy’s. I figured I would just get it the next time.

Lightbulb moment!

I determined that the $10 tip coincided with me cutting the grass while shirtless.

I ran the theory past my girlfriend.

“Well, aren’t you just a little whore?” she teased.

“Hey,” I teased back. “Ten bucks is ten bucks!”

It only took a couple of weeks to confirm my theory. Shirt off- $30. Shirt on- $20. Also, when I mowed shirtless, I noticed Amy spent a lot of time at the kitchen sink looking out the window that overlooked her backyard. Amy never mentioned the pay difference, the weather, or anything remotely on the topic. But I knew how to get that $10!

For context, I was in the best shape of my life in college. I had a group of friends who were all high school athletes like me, and we wanted to stay in shape. We lifted weights whenever we could.. The weight room at the student center was open 24/7, and we were frequent midnight visitors. I gained the freshman fifteen, but it was all muscle. My girlfriend talked me into shaving my chest and stomach so there was nothing impeding the view of my pecs and my six pack when I wasn’t wearing a shirt. She figured if sweat running down my chest made her weak in the knees, then Amy must enjoy the show as well.

Temps soared as the summer got deeper into July. Even when I went shirtless at Amy’s, I still wore jeans and boots. It was nearing 100° one Saturday, and it wasn’t even noon. I decided to go with an old pair of cut-off jean shorts for my mowing uniform that day.

“Hold on!” My girlfriend shouted. “Let’s do this right.”

She retrieved a pair of scissors from my desk drawer and cut about three inches from the length of the shorts. I tried them on. They were so short the front pocket lining extended beyond the denim. My girlfriend shrieked with delight and clapped her hands. She proceeded to snip away at the fabric and made the leg openings more angled in the back. The very bottoms of my butt cheeks peeked out from beneath the fabric.

“Go make that money!” she said as she slapped my ass.

I had just started mowing at Amy’s. I was shirtless and sporting my Daisy Dukes and work boots. The sweat was rolling down my body. I noticed Amy at the kitchen window. This time she wasn’t pretending to do the dishes or wipe the counters. Her nose was pressed against the glass like a kid looking into a candy store.

I finished up, enjoyed some lemonade and headed home. I ripped open the envelope as soon as I got inside. $40!

I told my girlfriend as soon as she came in from work.

“Such a tease,” she joked.

“Hey,” I answered. “Twenty dollars is twenty dollars…”

can't wait to read part 2

$40.00 was some kind of nice pay for just some looks being flashed

I'm thinking you'll soon be telling the tale of working on Amy's bush! Hope so!

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