Blade Runner
Evil spirits have invaded my subdivision.
I can find no other rational explanation for why someone would move 30 minutes
from town, plunk down a hunk of change for a few acres of “country,” then
proceed to tear out every shred of native flora excepting a few scrawny oaks,
build a house that looks like a Boston townhome or a fishing lodge in Wyoming,
and spend every waking hour of the weekend mowing.
The fellow across the road from us finally drove himself mad. Every Sunday he
would spend the entire day weedeating his five-acre pasture with a gas-powered
monstrosity with metal blades. We never saw him outside his house on any other
occasion.
One night as I was out in our front meadow trying to star-gaze in the glare of
my other neighbor’s vapor lights, a car came zipping down the road and
screeched to a halt at the Weedeater’s gate. A sheriff’s deputy jumped out and
ran up the driveway towards the darkened house. In a matter of minutes, eight
other sheriffs’ vehicles dashed up. Soon, the maniacal gardener – all 300,
naked pounds of him – was wrestled from his house, strapped to a board, and
stuffed inside the back of a Suburban. All the while, he screamed “I am Larry
McMurtry. Who the hell are you?” and then answered himself in a calmer voice,
“Get out. Get out. I am Earnest Hemingway.”
The house was put up for sale and we haven’t heard him whack a weed since. But
the ghost of his obsession remained and embodied itself in the neighbor just
around the corner. Last week he bought a riding lawn mower and mowed his three
acres of rocks, dust, and struggling grasses from nine in the morning until
dark. He spent the next day remowing his scalped property, while his immediate
neighbor began weed whacking around the shrubs growing along the roadside.
Here’s the scary part. Richard and I would like to make some of our grass
shorter – down in the meadow by the creek, right around the house, a
comfortable trail through the wildflowers to the garden. (Snakes, you know.) We
tried a push mower (people-powered) but these native grasses are so tall and
tough they snagged inside the rotating blades and stopped the mower short,
sending us flying over the handle bars. We tried a sickle, but the grasses
simply bowed out of the way and sprung back up. We thought of borrowing a goat,
but we worried about his lack of selectivity. And now, the specter of a gas
mower, spewing fumes and noise, adding to this urban cacophony, has entered our
heads. After I use it awhile, do you think I’ll believe myself to be Joyce
Carol Oates and Flannery O’Conner or will I be Jackie Collins and Anne Tyler?
I need mail! Write me at the Chronicle, PO Box 49066, Austin, 78765
or at Suzebe@aol.com.
This article appears in June 16 • 1995 and June 16 • 1995 (Cover).