We saw a handful of stories last year about fire crews, police officers and other public sector workers who stepped in to help the elderly or disabled to mow their lawns, and these acts of kindness and generosity have not stopped this year, in fact the idea of public sector workers mowing lawns has spread to Finland, where postal workers will mow lawns for people on Tuesdays, when the volume of mail is at its lowest.
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Posti, the Finnish postal service, is looking to top up revenue by offering the lawn mowing service to customers for a small fee. Customers must provide their own lawn mowers, and pay a small fee for the service, which is expected to be taken up by elderly or time-poor homeowners who would rather not cut the grass. The idea came from the postal workers themselves, after they were asked to come up with ideas for additional services that Posti could offer.
Postal workers have volunteered to be part of the scheme, so those that don’t want to mow lawns don’t have to. There is some concern from a property maintenance union that the postal workers don’t have the right training to operate the array of lawn mowers they will be expected to use, but given that the scheme is voluntary, that should mean that only people with the right skills will be participating in the postal mowing idea.
Across the pond, emergency services workers are still going above and beyond to provide a complete service to those who need it, as evidenced by the tale of the paramedics who finished mowing the lawn of an 87-year-old man who fainted while mowing the lawn in Sacramento, California. The man’s son, Ken Densley had been trying to convince his father to let him take over the duties, but the determined pensioner was having none of it, until the day he passed out during the mowing. The ambulance was called, and attended to the man, who refused hospital treatment. While the man was being cared for in his home, one paramedic, named as Chris Spires, finished mowing the lawn, despite protestations from Densley that he had already done enough to help. Spires checked with dispatch for any pressing calls, but upon learning that he was not needed elsewhere, started up the man’s mower and finished the job, even putting the mower away when he was done.
Ken Densley shared a picture of Spires mowing the lawn on his Facebook page, which has since been shared thousands of times. Well-wishers have suggested that Densley’s father use a sit on lawn mower if he really wants to cut his own grass, but it transpired that he already has one, but bought a push mower at age 86 because he wanted more exercise! After the fainting incident, the pensioner has allowed his son to take over lawn mowing duties, but we suspect that wasn’t an easy conversation to have, given the determination of the 87-year-old to maintain his independence.
81-year-old Roy Haley, of Borger, Texas, suffered a similar mishap when he fell off his new ride on lawn mower and his wife called the emergency services. Haley was treated at the scene and was found not to be badly injured, but the local fire department, who had also attended, decided they would finish mowing the lawn so Haley wouldn’t be tempted to get back on the mower that day. After finishing off the back garden, they noticed that the front lawn also needed mowing, so between four of them they cut the grass at the front of the house. Haley is very grateful to the fire crews for going out of their way to help; perhaps if he lived in Finland he would be jumping at the chance to have the chore taken care of by the postal service.