dirt farmer

Our new house is pretty cool. It has a big porch in the front, a utility room, plenty of closet space. Because we only have two smallish closets in the entirety of our current house, I'm especially happy about the linen closet. It is a closet dedicated to linens. An entire closet specializing in sheets and towels. It's like we're moving to Fantasy Island.


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Does being excited about a linen closet make me sound like a suburban asshole?


Just wait. You have no idea.


I'm most excited about yard work.

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Does that sound insane to you?

It does to me, especially considering that:

1) I've only operated a lawn mower twice in my life and it was one of those push things

2) Our current yard is pretty much a wreck.

3) I can barely keep house plants alive.

4) My memories of parental units doing yard work are not good ones. They involve alot of yelling, grunting, and grumbling. My dad once cracked two ribs when he was sideswiped off a ladder by a tree branch he'd just pruned.

5) It seems like a rule of homeownership that you have to hate yardwork. Either you have to hate hardwork or you have to be a some freakishly obsessive person who prefers conversing with flowers to making eye contact with neighbors.

After all, most people don't do yard work for the joy of it. It is something we do because our homeowner's covenant requires it or because we want to improve the "curb appeal" (ie the resale value) of our homes.

(Boy, that's a lesson in how to suck the joy out of things - make them about making money.)

Anyhow, I would like to imagine that I have some loftier goal in mind when I do yardwork like ... cue violin ... making things look pretty so's when we get home we have a beautiful green oasis to relax within.

But that's not why I'm excited about yardwork.

I'm excited because I like to dig in the dirt.