A friend of mine used to comment on how Americans like to have bumper stickers that say things, say things that anyone can read. So that's what this is, a big long annoying bumper sticker of opinion. My opinion tonight, is on lawns.
Last night I found myself in my dad's back lawn, (I'm always finding myself places). It might seem a perfectly normal place to be, sensible and logical even. But it's not. Not in my opinion, not on this bumper sticker blog.
I was in my dad's back lawn, or "the back yard", as we call it. Because I was raking up grass clippings. Again a "natural and logical place for a man to be" you might think to yourself. Well, you, you're probably American, or maybe Canadian, you think lawns are natural and normal. Well they aren't. They are cultural! I distinctly remember my history teacher telling us that lawns came into being in the 20th century, before that lawns were restricted to parks, they did not surround everyone's personal suburban dwelling.
I certainly don't remember seeing any lawns in Taiwan. That makes me an expert by the way. I admit though, I may have been feeling rebellious since I was listening to "Smashing Pumpkins" on my not-iPod as I was raking, raking in the dark. I was "raking in the dark" because I started at 6:30pm, and by 8:30pm it's dark. And first, of course, the lawn needed to be mowed, with a riding lawn mower, the law is smaller now than when I was a kid push mowing it, but now there is a riding lawn mower.
So with Billy Corgan crying to me in stereo, I scraped grass clippings up into my plastic rake, using it like a shovel, flopping it into the wheel barrow, going to each grass pile I had raked up earlier, wondering if it would get any darker. And wondering why the only time I was ever in the far back lawn was when I was mowing it. I could see the warm and inviting yellow glow coming from the glass door on the back of the house, 50 yards away, a tiny little rectangle of not-raking-up-stupid-senseless-grass light.
Over and over again, I kept saying to myself, "Why do we mow the lawn?" "Because we have a lawn." "Why do we have a lawn?" "So we will have something to mow." "Why do we mow the lawn?"...
I think we have lawns so that our neighbors will see that we are mowing them as we should, which is what we should be doing, what should be done. I don't think many people wonder why they have lawns most of the time. I think it's culture. something that is because it is. Wow listen to my rebelliousness against the establishment!
I gotta say though. This morning when I woke up, I ran out to that back glass door and gazed out admiring the fruits of my labor that I had been unable to see in the twilight. It sure does look good mowed. (edit 532) Permalink