Once upon a time, our weekends used to revolve around socialising. Now everything is arranged around getting the lawn done before the next storm rolls in. Photo: File.
They say – OK, a meme I saw one time says – ‘Once a man turns 30, he has to choose between an obsession with curing meats or his lawn’.
Obviously, I cackled. As if my ADHD, adrenaline-sports obsessed, workaholic husband has time for either of those fixations.
Oh how the mighty are fallen.
When we lived in our own flat in New Zealand his care plan for our narrow strip of lawn was as follows:
Ignore for several months.
Realise he is unable to pick up dog bombs because of the length of said lawn.
Borrow a weed whacker from his mate round the corner.
Attack small strip leaving behind lawn that looks like when your mum shaved your brother’s head instead of paying for a haircut.
Return weed whacker so late it necessitates the purchase of beers and possibly a meal for aforementioned mate around the corner.
Rinse and repeat.
I don’t know if there’s something in the soil – mind control microbes? But since our return to Australia there’s been a transformation.
We’re renting an older home with a moderate front and back yard that I assumed would be subject to the same treatment as our lawn in New Zealand.
At first, it was, except for the addition of a lawnmower left in the shed by our friendly landlord.
Then, so gradually I didn’t notice it, our weekend rhythm began to be affected by whether he would be able to get the lawns done.
I asked, foolishly, naively, if it really mattered that much whether or not he missed a single week.
Apparently there is a complex rotating system involving the front lawn, the back lawn and our green bin.
That’s fine. I understand we all face logistic constraints when it comes to house chores.
Then came the obsession with the edges. Each week, upon completion of the lawn, I am called upon to marvel at the beauty that is the edges.
(I’m not entirely sure what marks a good edge from a bad edge if I’m being honest, but I ooh and aah appreciatively anyway).
Surely, I thought, this is it. The lawns have gone from being a chore to a rigorously scheduled piece of performance art.
They’re not even our lawns. This must be where it ends.
Incorrect.
Despite my enthusiastic applause the edges, apparently, are still unsatisfactory. I’m not sure to whom they’re unsatisfactory because I haven’t noticed the dogs inspecting them and our visitors don’t usually make it much further than the kitchen.
A special tool was required. This necessitated a trip to Bunnings – a trip I was happy to jump on for my own nefarious gardening reasons.
After two hours spent in the lawn care aisle listening to husband dearest describe in detail a handheld tool that is apparently very common in the UK but that neither I nor the Bunnings staff had ever seen in our lives, we left, with great bitterness and disappointment.
Yesterday an Amazon package arrived. It contained a small, gleaming, machete-shaped implement.
Husband opened it with a glee usually reserved for a good bottle of whisky and promptly took it outside to spend the next couple of hours attacking any green thing that dared to be somewhere it oughtn’t.
I’m not sure when – or if – I’ll ever get him back.
I guess as a vegetarian I just have to be grateful he didn’t get into curing meat.
Loading ...
