Commentary by Tom Kuzeja October 23, 2001

Hi everyone. With all that's been going on, I had to do something today to pick myself up. I needed to do something purely American to get that patriotic blood pumping through my veins. And so I retreated to my yard and had a look around. I needed to cut my lawn.

Cutting and/or worrying about ones lawn seems somehow to be tied into the American dream. I mean, no other country in the world can match America's obsession with lawn care. We have dozens of equipment manufacturers producing a variety of general and specialty lawn care machines. We have seed, fertilizer, and pesticide companies convincing us that their products will give us the much coveted patch of perfect green. We spend money watering during dry spells. We employ a whole trade dedicated to doing the dirty work for us.

With all these opportunities, we American home owners seem to fall into different levels, categories or classes, if you will. Over time, I have felt my desire to keep up with the Jones' fading more and more (thank God!). My lawn is no exception. Let's analyze where I might fall.

I fired up my Toro self-propelled Recycler lawn mower. Hey, I know to be a totally affluent American I should be riding my mower or better yet, have some service come and do the dirty work for me, but I haven't ascended to that upper echelon yet. Nevertheless, I gassed up my old mower and went to town.

On this day, I decided that the northwest to southeast diagonal cutting pattern was in order. Done properly, one must start with the perimeter and cut the border. This border serves as the rotation point of the lawn mower, essential with a parallel cutting swath pattern such as the diagonal cut. By merely contemplating the bevy of lawn patterns at my disposal, I surely have placed myself in one of the upper lawn maintenance classes.

Having cut the perimeter, I began the stripe by stripe manicuring of my lawn. It looks fantastic, thanks in great part to the fertilizer I put down this year. However, I failed to do any watering at all this summer. I know... with an attitude like that and its resulting lack of lawn care performance, I may never break away from my humble standing in this community.

Inspired by hope, I decided to finish the project off with truly American style; with the help of my electric leaf blower, I removed the unsightly grass clippings from my driveway and walkway.

So to recap:

These results are indeed encouraging but can they be sustained? Thankfully the end of lawn care season is nearing up here in Massachusetts.

But what of winter and the labors associated with her? I need to find some patriotic themes here. Maybe I'll mull it over whilst I sealcoat my driveway.