28 June 2026, Freewriters Community Daily Writing Prompt Day 3148: there’s no job for Bob
The Trent yard had a great scar in it from the tree that had at last fallen and brought up its historical and dark secret; at last came the day when new sod was brought out by the owner, Mr. Thomas Stepforth Sr., father of Mrs. Melissa Trent, to cover it. It came with enough workmen to cover it, but …
“I wanna help – I'm good at putting stuff on the floor!” said five-year-old Lil' Robert Ludlow from two doors down, but coming into the Trent yard from running through the yard of his Lee cousins.
The workmen waved him off with a laugh, but Mr. Stepforth saw Lil' Robert's lip start quivering and his eyes fill with tears, and also caught the look of Capt. R.E. Ludlow Sr. and the pain on his face as he came to retrieve his heartbroken baby grandson.
“You know, I do need someone to ride point as supervisor-in-training,” Mr. Stepforth, also a grandfather himself, said, and held out his arms to Lil' Robert, who smiled through his tears and went running to the grandfather of his Trent friends. He sat up on Mr. Stepforth's shoulders and learned all about how to lay sod down while the workmen did the job, and then was sent home happy.
“Yeah, I see why you work out every day, picking that one up and putting him down,” Mr. Stepforth said to Capt. Ludlow later on. “Robert Edward Ludlow III looks small, but that boy is thicc.”
“He has baby fat and precocious muscle at the same time,” Capt. Ludlow said. “Quite a combo – but, thank you so much.”
“You're welcome – I could see he really wants to help and learn,” Mr. Stepforth said. “What I also realized is that you completely understood the pain he was in.”
“At his age I was Baby Bob,” Capt. Ludlow said, “and if you really wanted to hear some pre-basso profondo yelling across the Blue Ridge, let people be doing something interesting, but 'there's no job for Bob'! My Lil' Robert was about to mess Tinyville all the way up!”
“You know he is loud but he is not – we rarely hear him crying, and he is not as forward loud as Edwina or George,” Mr. Stepforth said. “I mean, he is having a good time out here, and he talks a bunch, but he generally is communicating, not yelling.”
“Lil' Robert is a very kind, generous man-to-be,” Capt. Ludlow said with a chuckle. “He is sweet-tempered and definitely a lover, not a fighter, except in self-defense – then he becomes all me.”
“You know he thinks he's going to West Point,” Mr. Stepforth said.
“And he may well do so because the discipline will not hurt him,” Capt. Ludlow said, “but, he also is such a natural communicator and athlete that life may offer him different choices. I will not be unhappy if any of my grandsons follow me to the Army, but I also will not be unhappy if life offers them a kinder path than mine. I regret nothing that I have done in the service of this country, but I also carry a burden that they need not.”
“I often think about that in terms of Milton – both my son and my son-in-law have said pretty much that about him,” Mr. Stepforth said. “But it seems to me that if you know you have a lover, not a fighter, you might want to steer him in the path he is naturally going.”
“We agree completely,” Capt. Ludlow said as he watched his again-happy baby grandson streaking across the yard after his slightly bigger sister Amanda as both of them were laughing.