Deny it as we might, the twilight of summer is upon us. Labor Day and back-to-school sales flyers serve as requiem for the season. In the words of Shakespeare, "(Summer) hath too short a date."
However, I doubt old Bill S. would pine for one endless bit of summer: cutting the grass. Late-season lawn mowing is not the stuff of sonnets. It is better suited to limericks that start with that man from Nantucket.
While fall feels fast approaching, mowing season remains at turtle throttle speed. What seemed like a labor of love (or like) four months ago has simply turned laborious. This time of year I start to despise the green, green grass of home.
The worst part is that I can only blame myself for this PTO-engaged purgatory. I water the lawn. I fertilize the lawn. I thatch, rake, and perform other Pleasant Valley Sunday subdivision tasks to the lawn. I do these things out of black-socks-with-Bermuda-short rituals passed down from father to son.
Actually, I do these brainless chores to justify a true brain-drain activity: televised sports.
Mowing the lawn wasn't always a mundane task of adulthood. There was a time when I relished the smell of freshly cut grass; even if I was the one pushing the Briggs and Stratton mower. Ah, the innocence and ignorance of youth.
Then came the day when I was entrusted with the little key and big responsibility of the John Deere rider. For a newly minted teenager, I had reached the pinnacle of grass mowing. Despite four forward speeds at my disposal, it was all backward and downhill from there.
The sweet smell of mowed grass turned sour with my first summer job. As a Youth Corps leader, I earned $4.25 an hour leading a group of teens in an exercise in futility. For three months, on almost a daily basis, we cut the grass behind every guardrail in the county. That summer I learned two things: how to drive a three-on-the-tree truck transmission, and that grass can stain more than bluejeans.
Who knew a blade of grass could impale your psyche. Today I wear ear protection not to muffle the tractor's drone but to mute the screams of mulched fescue.
So the obvious question is why sow these seeds of discontent? Why not plant a yard of ground cover or green plastic indoor/outdoor carpet? Simply put, it is the barefoot factor. The feel of green grass between toes remains a rite of summer.
It was solely this sole foot feeling that led to grass being planted at our new home three years ago. I knew a Pandora's box, or in this case a hydro-seed sprayer, had been opened.
So it will be in the fading light of summer that I'll be mowing grass by headlight. As the calendar flips to September, leaves turn color and summer becomes a lingering memory. A bittersweet moment marked by poetic words. Naturally, I have a few choice words for late-summer mowing season; most are unfit for sonnets or to be heard over the screams of mulched fescue.
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