God never said, "Thou shalt grow a beautiful, weed-free lawn and use up all your
free time and spare money taking care of it."
But grass grows faster than lawn mower blades can spin, and never in the right place,
and it's constantly hungry. Whole driveways have been swallowed up by the same green force
that dines on mower blades and expensive fertilizer.
Who started the rumor that the Great American Dream is a perfect lawn?
The dream can become reality, we are told by the experts who sell fertilizer. They
assure us that grass will out-grow weeds if nurtured properly. There is proof this is not
just propaganda designed to get the green in our wallets. But the proof is not in my lawn.
It's in the expansive green moats surrounding America's banks.
As I wait in line at the drive-up window of my bank, I can't help but wonder if bankers
want us to turn grass-green with envy. Ever notice that the more beautiful the bank's lawn
is, the slower the tellers are?
Everyone with a blotch of earth around his abode dreams of owning a lawn like the
bank's. But tell me, what's the point of slaving over a lawn -- mowing it, liming it,
spraying it, watering it, fertilizing it and mowing it again -- just to get it to look
like the bank's? I can think of better ways to get fresh air and exercise.
Lawns are dangerous. A single plot of grass can turn a successful businessman into a
hopeless failure. On Mondays through Fridays, he breezes through complicated contracts
that shape his corporation and the local economy. But on weekends, this same man walks
back and forth and back and forth all around his house, pushing a noisy motor on tiny
wheels.
Suddenly he stops, stares at something in his lawn -- a brown spot! An ugly
interruption in the green carpet of his dreams -- and lets out a long, loud moan that
resounds down the street to the neighbors who nod sympathetically.
You'd think that with all our technology and bio-engineering, we could invent a grass
that doesn't grow up but grows out to fill in the bald spots. We can do it for men's heads
with hair plugs. Why not grass plugs that always remain an even, perfect height?
But Moses didn't come down from the mountain with the commandment, "Thou shalt
imitate the banks and other worldly institutions where profits are donated to lawns,"
did he?
Next time I'm tempted to nurture my lawn by buying grass seed or fertilizer or lime or
weed killer or bug killer, I think, instead, I'll go bicycling with the kids and donate
the money I just saved to Covenant House or some other worthy charity that nurtures
people.
People don't have to be raked.
