It’s hard to pinpoint the exact day the decision was made. I imagine it was the result of a series of micro-aggressions from our lawnmower- refusals to start, deciding to faint when there was on a tiny patch more to mow, an inability to cope with anything slightly fibrous or stringey- that got us asking. ‘Why are we doing this?’.
We could all think of a thousand other things we’d rather be doing than mowing lawns. Most of the year, they were too wet to sit on. We protected them, even though we weren’t sure why. Enough was enough. We were rebelling. No more lawns.
I admit this decision was made easy by the fact my husband is a green thumb. I am a forest admirer, whilst he is a forest grower. All things of the soil flourish under his watch. Our previously pesky back lawn is now a jungle. But it is the front lawn l want to speak of for today. And more specifically, the grass.
Once we stepped back and let things grow, it was naturally, the grass that first took over. In the beginning, a thick blanket of green, but as it got higher and higher, it became a mini-meadow. And let me tell you what this proliferation has lead to: it’s the ingredients for butterflies and birds.
To step within the bounds of my previously boring lawn these days is to release a flurry of confetti made of wings. Small birds rise up by the handfuls, only moments before hidden within the stalks and seedheads.
I find myself staring out the kitchen window, watching the tiniest of bird’s balance on the end of a single strand of grass and marveling how they both don’t keel over.
I read the other day how small birds can lose almost half of their body weight in a night when there are storms and love how our garden is now a thicket of protection for tiny bodies, needing somewhere to shelter.
It’s also got me thinking about weeds, and how a weed is only a weed because of context, and our thoughts of good and bad. And how with all our mowing and all our grazing there are fewer and fewer places for little lives that needs long grass and safe meadows to nest and rest and frolic and shelter.
Which makes me look at our long and wild grass now and feel pleased.
My #11 Happiness is long grass and rediscovered meadows.