Gnome Tales: Digger

 

by Pa Rock

Friend of the Gnomes

Digger Gnome was born in the Bavarian foothills of the Alps more than a century ago.  He entered this life in a small patch of wild flowers that was growing beneath a large linden tree and near a stream that started high in the mountains.  Digger was the fourth of seven brothers, some of whom had already reached their full fourteen inches in height by the time he was born.

Gnomes don't name their babies until they begin forming their own identities, so Digger didn't get his name until he was several years old and started showing a preference for playing with the small shovel that Grandpa Gnome had made for him.  Grandpa Gnome and the young gnome's parents soon began calling him "Digger," and so he remained for the rest of his gnome life.

All of the gnomes in that part of Bavaria worked on dairy farms, and when Digger was old enough to handle a real gnome shovel, he was sent to the farm of Herr Gruber, the place where each of his three older brothers also worked.  Digger, who arrived at the farm carrying his own shovel and bucket, was assigned to shovel and haul buckets of manure from the pastures to Frau Gruber's large garden and cabbage patch.    

Life on the Gruber's dairy farm was wonderful and Digger loved it very much.  He could often be heard whistling as he worked. There were lots of gnomes working at the Gruber's farm besides Digger and his brothers, and Digger made many friends and enjoyed life.  But nothing remains the same, and as Digger Gnome began to age he could feel changes in his body - and he knew that he was slowly turning to iron and would one day be carted off to permanent guard duty in some other garden.

(Really good gnomes turn to stone or cast iron after their working years have passed, and not-so-good gnomes become plastic.)

Digger suspected that he would turn to iron because that had been the fate of his three older brothers:  Arlo, Boris, and most recently Claude.  The younger brothers - Elon, Fibber, and Gus - were all still sprightly and active with their farm chores, though Elon seemed to suffer from self-importance syndrome and often seemed to think that he was the boss instead of a common fly-catcher.   If any of the gnomes became plastic, it would be Elon.

Digger still had his shovel in his hand when he had completely transformed to iron, and the shovel was iron, too.

Eventually all seven Gnome brothers did turn to heavy cast iron, from the soles of their work boots, to the tips of their pointy red caps.  Frau Gruber, a woman who knew how to make a mark and keep a mark, sold the brothers and many other iron gnomes to a big American retailer who gave them all fresh coats of paint, placed them in shiny boxes, and sold them in America  to guard gardens there.

The seven Gnome brothers went to a large box store in Phoenix, Arizona, when an old fart named Pa Rock bought them all and placed them outdoors in his cactus garden where they baked in the hot Arizona sun three hundred and sixty-five days each year.  When Pa Rock retired, he carefully sat the Gnome brothers in the backseat of his car and drove them to their new home in Missouri where they took up duties guarding flower beds and bird feeders.  Missouri, unlike Arizona, has four distinct seasons and the constant changes in weather have been very hard on the cast iron brothers.   Now they are faded, and discolored, and even have splotches of rust.

Digger, who is still holding fiormly to his shovel, had a very rough summer last year.   He fell (or was pushed by a miscreant squirrel) from the block on which he was standing and spent several weeks face down in the overgrown grass - which was often wet.  When Pa Rock finally discovered him in that sad repose, he brought the poor, highly discolored gnome into the house and determined he would be the first to be rejuvenated.  But that has not happened yet, and for now poor Digger is just a very surreal, almost scary, paperweight.

Pa Rock, who has six grandchildren, has decided that he will give each the privilege of caring for one of the gnomes after  he himself turns to cast iron (or plastic) (or compost).    He has big plans to sand and repaint the Bavarian gnomes with his shaky old hands and give one to each grandchild.  The fate of the seventh is yet to be determined.

Now all Pa Rock needs is a kick in the butt to get him started!