My family moved in a small house in Brighton, Colorado on my seventh birthday. My first memory is our neighbor Bill, an old man, handing me strawberries from his garden through a hole in the chain-link fence. "We need to make the hole bigger," he said jokingly. Later I knew that he lived alone.
Bill spent much time working in the garden, and I was always talking to him from our yard. I was a chatterbox. I think what drew me to Bill is that he never got tired of listening to me. I also think Bill saw a lot of himself in me — we were both lonely and anxious — and that may be why he always took the time to listen to me. It was a wonderful connection.
There weren't any kids of my age in the neighborhood, and my parents were very busy, so I mostly played in the yard with my dog. I had a lot of imaginary friends — a whole family, actually, with a wife, children, a best friend... no joke. Weird kid.
One day, my parents asked Bill whether he'd watch me while they were away on business. This worked for everyone, so it became a somewhat monthly occurrence. Bill had a spare room in his house, which became "my" room.
Bill promised to teach me to drive the lawn tractor(割草机) someday and I was always looking forward to it. In winter, Bill would attach a snowplow(铲雪机) to the front of the dawn tractor. I seriously told him that I would invent a better snowplow when I grew up. "Sure you will. You'll get a patent certificate. It takes a certificate to prove an important thing," Bill said with a smile.
One snowy morning, an idea suddenly hit me. My parents were watching TV when I spit it out, "What if I adopted Bill as my grandpa?" My parents said I could go over and ask him.
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I knocked on his door, sat down in his living room, and asked, "Can I adopt you as my grandpa?"
……
The next morning, while learning to drive the lawn tractor with a snowplow, I accidentally plowed down our chain-link fence.
