Zen Veg and Other Nonsense

May 11, 2024

ZenTopGunZenVeg!

There is an irony of this juxtaposed scenario.  I am face down in a garlic bed, cursing the invasive violets, stealing nutrients from my spicy, spiky children.  I hear the massive bumblebees working on the purple Dead Nettle for their food, I hear the birds chirping.  I can discern the Blue Jay bellowing and the Carolina Wren warbling.  There is the occasional slow grind of a logging truck trying to get up to speed as it passes by my nano-farm.

The sky is blue, cloudless; the temperature is perfect, low humidity with a light breeze.  I flick the earthworms who hitchhike on weed roots back into the garlic bed so they can do their eating and pooping and good work.  Almost out of nowhere comes a dull roar.  At first, it didn’t even register.  However, within about 12 seconds an ear-blasting explosion of an F16 flying low and loud shocked me.  It was so loud my ears rang for a while.  My osteoporotic bones rattled.  I texted my neighbor and told him that I might have just had a slight stroke and he replied, “Yeah, they have become fond of flying really low.”

They must exercise.  From what I know, they come thru here from the Norfolk Naval base, 180 miles away.  As they have capacity to fly 1500 mph, at top speed, this jaunt is nothing for them.  Or it may be the army base Fort Pickett, 18 miles away.  Regardless, these highly designed efficient machines puncture my peace, but also make me swoon with envy.  Why?  Because I can’t seem to even keep a lawn mower working.

Did you ever feel like you had a specific curse with a specific thing?  No matter what you do, no matter your choices, the stuff breaks, blows up, catches fire, or otherwise disappoints you.  This is me and lawn mowers.  I currently made the leap to a GreenWorks rider, electric mower that worked for 6 weeks and is now awaiting a service call pickup because the blades refuse to engage even with full batteries.  Prior to that I thought, let’s go American and I purchased a Cub Cadet.  That **(((**%@#r.  There are not enough dirty words available to describe that experience.  Prior to “that” debacle was my Husqurvana.  Even though we rebuilt it about 7 times in its 17-year existence, that baby ran. 

We went to electric push mowers.  So far, I’m on number two.  The first was an Echo and some glitch rendered her disabled.  Clearly, the answer is to have no more than a half-acre of grass and get everything else in flowers, cover crop or hell, why not just have 3 acres of cucumbers!!  It is my dream to continue to eradicate the grass and have anything but in its place.  Except, of course, the dreaded Poison Ivy.    

I am not entirely alone in my unnatural hatred of grass.

Designing an end to a toxic American obsession: The Lawn | CNN

I fantasize about stepable mint, moss, creeping thyme, ajuga, any ground cover that doesn’t need machine maintenance or at least minimal attention.  I imagine orchards and permaculture combinations that preserve the moisture in the soil and encourage the diverse plants that keep the pollinators sustained.  I am looking to replace as much of my grass/pasture as possible because it makes no sense to me to have a pasture that is not feeding goats or cows or donkeys, doesn’t feed the birds and drains me of my precious resources, time and money, mowing.  A little bit of mowing can be meditative; a lot of mowing is monotonous.  Time wasted when I’d rather be growing food.  Ditch the lawn.

Grass Alternatives: 12 Low-Maintenance Lawn Replacements | Almanac.com

Of course, not everyone on the internet agrees with the suitability of ground cover, lawn replacements, but the Almanac article gives food for thought. 

More sass, less grass.  I might just start throwing seed bombs everywhere.  Top Gun and Seed bombs; feeling militaristic. 

And here we are at ZenVeg Updates. 

My 3 days out at the farm need to include planting the peppers, potatoes, and tomatoes.  If time permits, cucumber seeds must find soil to make love to so that all the world can have pickles and sour cream, onion and cuke salad.  Growing produce is just a weird romance. Sometimes the chemistry is right, sometimes not.  Too wet, too hot, these plants can be finicky.  Sometimes the only food I can grow is for the stupid worms, stink bugs and squash bugs.  Oh, yeah, they’ve got their groceries!    

More beans, lettuce, radishes, let’s even pull out the Okra.  My point is, I may not be able to mow to the satisfaction of others in the realm of the property, but I will put those maters and taters in the ground.  I remind myself of the path taken; retirement, road-trips, re-invention.  An 80 hour a week entrepreneurial effort would be required to whip this place into shape.  However, I planned on being half city mouse/half country mouse during retirement year #1.  ZenVeg will just have to be satisfied with a little bit here and there. 

In conclusion, recently the Starliner rocket, designed for a crewed mission to the Space Station scrapped the launch because of some mechanical malfunction.  If NASA can carry on with their billion-dollar snafus, I guess me, and my lawn mower curse is no big deal.  Meanwhile, that day that TopGun was in the skies, they delighted me when I looked up and saw them barrel-rolling through the blue horizon.  I applaud their working machines.  Very jealous. 

The Struggle is Real!!

Until next time, Trish the Lawn Mower Slayer