Justin Rehmert turned his love for mowing into art on a playing field

HUMBOLDT, Tenn. — If you’ve ever been to a Humboldt softball or baseball game, you probably noticed something unique about their playing surface — it’s a piece of art.

The man behind the plan is Justin Rehmert, better known as Remi, and he said he sees the ball field as a blank canvas.

“I mean just mowing the grass and the hard work you put in and just seeing the outcome of it,” Rehmert said. “There’s no one out here and it’s so peaceful, I’ll get on the gator and just ride.”

Mayor Marvin Sikes of Humboldt and Remi’s boss, Jeff Graves, put all their trust in him 10 and a half years ago, telling him to do what you do best. But there was a catch — he’d be in control of eight fields, all by himself.

“When they told me it was me by myself, I said I want a challenge,” Remi said.

He took it head-on, restoring all fields, which he said were in bad shape, to the things of beauty we see now.

“There are some patterns I do myself, like I did a baseball pattern on the infield,” Remi said. “I mean sometimes it just comes to you.”

To create such masterpieces, Remi sometimes spends two or three hours on one field, but you better not tell him all he does is cut grass.

“There’s aerefication, there’s fertilization, there’s chemicals adds, there’s so much more that goes into it than just mowing the field,” he said.

And while everyone may not have seen his artwork, Remi said there will be plenty of time to check it out for the foreseeable future because he plans on doing this until he retires.