May 11, 2007
A Joy to Behold
There are many things that you will never, ever hear me say:
“Mmmm, that vegan meal was delicious!”
“I just don’t feel right unless I jog five miles every morning.”
“But Bruce, we can’t – I’m married!”
Also on that list for many, many years: “I have to get home and finish the yard work that I started this morning.”
Yard. Work. Two words I’m happy to use on a regular basis. But never together.
Until this week.
To justify my early retirement, I’ve been trying to do as much around the house as humanly possible to make Husband’s life easier. My plan is that he will soon get used to home cooked meals and a spotless house and only wearing his underwear for one day before washing it, and he’ll beg me never to go back to work.
Traditionally, anything that fell outside the house walls –- i.e. the cars, the yard, the big money –- was his responsibility. I don’t shovel. I don’t pick up poop. I don’t get the oil changed. I don’t plant flowers.
But let’s face it -– there’s only so much I can dust before there just isn’t any dust left. I’m telling you, you could perform surgery in my kitchen. I served punch out of my toilet at the cast party last weekend.
So yesterday, I took a good look at the front of our house… and promptly died of shame.
When I came back to life, I thought, My God, that crap under our tree is totally overgrown. It’s starting to take over our driveway. And the neighbors’ driveway. And I’m pretty sure that fern has been extinct for 400 billion years. Yeah, that’s all gonna have to go.
It’s pretty sad when you look homeless while actually standing in front of your house. So I put on my gloves, got a broom and that clipper thingy, opened an official “Yard Waste” bag and started at it.
And people, I have discovered N*I*R*V*A*N*A!!! I can’t even explain what fulfillment yard work has brought me! I love it! I want to write bad poetry about it! I want to ride past its house on my bike twenty times a day! I want to marry it!
I can work for a scant half an hour, and then stand back and survey the clean edges, the lack of dead brown stuff, and the patio! Did we always have a patio?
My inner Obsessive/Compulsive is so, so gratified by yard work. It’s so much different than housework. See, I can clean the whole house, and by the next morning, there’s sticky stuff on the counter and dog hair tumbleweeds in the corners and water spots on the bathroom mirror.
But clean up the yard… and it’s paradise! The weeds will take at least a couple weeks to grow back. There won’t be leaves falling for months! I can make it lovely, and it will STAY lovely for days and days and days! A joy to behold all summer!
There’s also the added benefit of a good work-out. One of the dozens of reasons I hate exercising is that I always feel like I could be doing something else much more immediately rewarding, like bidding on eBay or baking cookies. But with yard work, I get stuff done AND get to suffer for it physically! It’s nature’s most perfect activity!
Of course, I’m still not going to plant stuff. That’s Husband’s job. Plants commit suicide in my presence. But if I’m only touching stuff that’s already dead or that I want to be dead, I’m golden! I can use my powers for good instead of evil!
Wow. I guess that’s another thing I never thought I’d hear myself say.
Comments
OK, this is one of the most disturbing things you've ever posted. I think you better go lay down and take a nap until you come to your senses.
Posted by: Marty at May 11, 2007 02:36 PM
Wanna come to my house for a visit? My yard is a mess, and you could have so much fun!
-Lori
Posted by: Lori at May 15, 2007 12:36 PM
Bah. Not sure we can be friends anymore, you see, I have this foliage-phobia thing going on and between my sibling and my mother, I cannot handle another person talking about outdoor things....
Posted by: Vicki at May 16, 2007 03:31 PM
Bah. Not sure we can be friends anymore, you see, I have this foliage-phobia thing going on and between my sibling and my mother, I cannot handle another person talking about outdoor things....
Posted by: Vicki at May 16, 2007 03:31 PM