Dear AAP -
What is it with people and their lawns? and I'm saying this as someone who now has a lawn of his own for the first time in his life. A long story, and the usual one, that involves settling down and moving to a safer town with good schools for junior and all that lame middle-class stuff. I'm glad to finally have my own basement to set up guitars and drumkits in, but I find myself, in spite of every effort to NOT give a shit, becoming obsessed with lawn care. I've known how to mow a lawn since childhood of course, and at first I figured I just didn't want to have THE shittiest lawn on the street so that the neighbors wouldn't think we were punk/trash ... which is weird too because I never cared what other people thought and all that, but now ? and I just didn't expect to be INTO the fertilizing and weeding and all that... and now we're at the tail-end of our first real summer and I'm googling to find out how to best prepare the yard for the coming winter freeze. This is not me. I ask myself who it IS. My wife thinks it is funny. I don't think I'm turning into my father, but I am starting to fear we might have more in common than I would have suspected before. What is this all about?? - LawnBoy
Dear LawnBoy-
I'm going to assume this isn't a bogus email. I'm not 100% sure because it just felt a little iffy the first couple of times I read through it, but it raises a sort of universal question, and I'm inclined to give anyone who would bother writing in to me the benefit of the doubt, so here goes...
At the moment I'm sitting at my desk in my apartment. It is a fairly tidy place, especially for a guy who lives alone. I'm far from being a neat freak believe me, but it is a clean and fairly well-organized living space. Hanging on one of my walls is a poster from the first Ramones show I ever attended (circa 1981 - cost of admission: $2.) For the past 28 years that poster has taken up wall space in every apartment and flophouse I've found myself living (or flopping) in... So, what is different now? Instead of sticking it up with thumbtacks this time I felt compelled to put it in a cheap frame and HANG it on my wall... somehow making it (and everything else currently surrounding me that is likewise framed and hung) more "grown-up." No one told me to put this stuff in frames, just like no one told me to put my mattress on a bed frame now, instead of just having it on the floor... Some things just get tired and start feeling over done. Here is another example: When I lived back in Boston my bathroom was completely mis-matched in typical punk (or just plain young bachelor) fashion... but when I moved to California and had to go out and buy towels, a bathmat and a toothbrush holder etc. it then seemed like actually making the effort to purchase stuff that was mis-matched on purpose would be a senseless "pose." Just getting everything in dark green was easier and made more sense. So I got everything in dark green. Is that "selling out?" or is it just a dropping of some of the bullshit?
Your new devotion to lawn care is probably like that. It is one thing to self-righteously "not care" what some idiot on the subway thinks of your mohawk and shredded T-shirt, but it is another thing to not care about living peacefully with your next door neighbor, someone you might be dealing with daily for the next 30 years. It is also about creating visual proof of your family's stability, not for the neighbors, but for your son. Even the most dedicated iconoclast doesn't want his/her kid thinking that they live in the shittiest house in town. Sure, you want to teach them that money and "appearances" aren't everything, but you also want him to be proud of where he lives and proud of his folks. A clean house and tidy yard is part of that.
But you're right to be on your guard. You don't want it to turn into some obsession. I've known some guys who used their lawn care chores as a way of escaping all other family interaction. No one can talk to you or hassle you when you've got the mower or the weed-whacker fired up. Also, nothing is worse than the dad who obsesses over the lawn to the extent that he won't let the kids play on it. Remember that you're raising a boy, not grass. Don't spend your entire Saturday mowing, mulching, fertilizing and edging... Do your upkeep and then play catch on that lawn with your son, or retreat to the basement with him and jam... just do SOMEthing together.
...and finally: I'm sure a few people will write in about how wasteful grass lawns are from an environmental standpoint etc etc and etc... I'll head off those comments by saying that I agree with you all, but this question wasn't really about lawn care, now was it?
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment