How to Achieve a Ghetto Lawn

I arrived home last night after work to find an obtrusive flyer flying out of our mailbox. When I looked at it, I laughed. Then I sighed. Then I said who cares (out loud) and went inside where it’s cool and homey and perfect. The oversized flyer was from a local lawn company. It was a fancy fold-out flyer with detailed information about weed control and grass growing and general lawn maintenance. The best part was inside – a hand written note about weed control. The note said they were here to offer help, like we are in need of some sort of yard intervention. It was tender and kind hearted and just a little sad. See, The Illingworth Manor Lawn isn’t exactly pruned and fertilized. It’s more when-we-bought-the-house-the-grass-seed-didn’t-grow-and-we-haven’t-had-time-to-fix-it-what-with-all-the-wedding-nonsense-as-of-late. It’s not that we don’t care. We have gone so far as to price grass seed. We’ve also spent a hot afternoon pulling weeds – to the point of sheer muscle spasms that lasted for days. We talk about it quite a bit. We look out the window and say “hey, look at that yard”. But there hasn’t been enough time or money or weather cooperation to fully tend to the muddy pit of weeds that surrounds our house. And it’s not too terrible. We do have about 42 blades of grass (slowly dying in the heat). We have a few bushes that have managed to survive our neglect. And we have a FIELD of clover. Big fat tall clover. Clover for miles. Days. Years. I keep expecting to round the corner and see the end of the rainbow in the middle of our yard. Really this is a secret dream, finding the pot of gold. Just this morning Ryan and I were trying to think of a way to make one million dollars. We don’t really want more than that. Just one measly million. I googled “how to make one million dollars” and all that came up were articles about ROTH IRAs and how to save the money you have. Well that’s the point – we don’t have any right now and we want it right now, not when we are 65. (Note: when Ryan is 65 I will be 73. Should I wait that long for my million??) But what we DO have is a ghetto lawn to be proud of. And we are proud. We have achieved the kind of lawn that neighbors secretly meet about and scorn. The kind of lawn that keeps nosy no-gooders from “dropping by” with welcome cookies or a tuna casserole when really all they want to do is check you out and report back to the others. So far no one has said hello to us. No one has rung the doorbell except for that one PESKY salesman that practically took the door off its hinges trying to get in. (He also RIPPED the “free sample” of his carpet cleaner from my hands when I told him to get lost.) But I don’t care. I’m loving my new house and my new husband and my ghetto lawn. There’s a neighborhood block party coming up, and Ryan and I considered making buttons to wear that say “We’re the ones with THE YARD”.
If you would like to achieve the bliss I live in, follow these easy steps:
1. Do not water your lawn, ever.
2. Do not seed your grass, ever.
3. Don’t notice the weeds until they are knee-high and cover the water spigot on the side of the house, and then after finally noticing them, continue to ignore.
4. Repeat.