So let me tell you a story.  It’s about a young woman of a certain age living in a great townhouse in a bedroom community.  She had been living in this home for years, and was quite happy.  Even the neighbors had proven to be friendly.

This home had a back yard.  Nothing fancy, really.  It was the right size for the townhouse.  Her blind dog Zeke considered it his last sanctuary between him and the big bad world.  It had a good amount of grass and half the yard was in shade all day from her deck.  It could have proven to be quite a space, had she put forth any effort there.  But she didn’t.  She didn’t pride herself on being all that traditional, but she still found outside spaces to be masculine territory.  As a matter of consequence, the grass in her yard grew into various and interesting looking weeds over the years. 

This young woman relied on her at-the-time gentlemen callers, male roommates, or even the young 12-, 14-, 16-year-old kids down the street for any yard work.  But this season she found that the grass/weeds had grown considerably and she hadn’t been paying it any attention.  She called people she knew, but no one was available to cut her seemingly fast-growing jungle of a yard.  She let days pass.  It was getting embarrassing.  She imagined the neighbors on either side of her home probably whispered about it.  Perhaps it was the topic of conversation at the dinner table:

“That poor young woman, Henry.  No one will cut her grass…”
“Don’t ‘poor woman’ me, Henrietta.  She should just hire a damn lawn service.  All those weeds- growing taller than her own damn dog!  Damn blind dog wanders around like he’s lost in the woods!  Outrageous!  She should be embarrassed!”

One particular bright sunny day, as she was leaving home to get into work, she let Zeke out to do his business and was aghast at how horrible her yard looked.  The weeds had grown to half the height of her fence!  Zeke could barely move to find a good spot!  Could she brave cutting this jungle on her own?  Why not?  She could do anything, right?  What’s a little yard work?

On her way home, she ventured into that great city, Home Depot.  Shiny tools, extension cords, and spare parts were the weapons she was after.  She got home and donned the jeans she wore as a freshman in high school (couldn’t throw them out.  Sentimentality, of course), a long sleeve shirt, and the oldest tennys she could find in her closet.  She plugged in her $59 weed eater and….

Promptly completely and utterly butchered her entire yard.  And butchered was a kind word for it.

All in all she didn’t do a bad job.  She hadn’t suffered injuries, save for two little splinters.  She’d wished for yard gloves; hadn’t been on her list of weapons.  Perhaps next time.  She appraised her work.  Yes, there were out and out bald spots now, all over the “lawn”, and yes, the entire ground was now uneven- but by god there wasn’t a jungle anymore.  She smiled.  She’d conquered this one lost territory of her home.  Sure, she essentially hacked her way through weeds like a mental-patient-turned-new, talentless, untrained-hairdresser-with-an-axe-to-grind….  But at least the weeds were gone.

After gathering all the loose weeds, leaves, and twigs into a single pile in the middle of the yard, she came inside and cleaned up.  She let Zeke outside.  He took a nice steamy crap right on top of said pile of dead earth.  Perhaps that was his own way of saying Good Riddance!

Conquering this tiny piece of land made this young woman of a certain age feel as if she’d finally moved into her home, for the first and last time.  It was a good day.  Maybe now the neighbors would stop whispering.