Why I Hate Mowing the Lawn

I hate mowing the lawn. Hate it, hate it, hate it. Growing up my two brothers and I took turns mowing the lawn. Every three weeks I grudgingly took my turn. Many weeks I used my hard-earned money from teaching horse lessons to pay one of my bros ten bucks to mow the lawn on my turn. That was money well spent.

Before Mitch and I got married I told him that I refused to mow the lawn. I let him know that I would do the dishes, the laundry, scrub the toilet, and any other chore that a good wife should do, but I refused to mow the lawn. Mitch was fine with that. (He's such a perfectionist about the lawn that he probably didn't want me to do it anyways.)

Now we've been married for two years and I have never mowed the lawn. Until today. Mitch has been really busy lately with work, so I decided to be a good little wifey and mow the lawn. (Okay, I only mowed the front lawn ... the back lawn wasn't nearly as long.) As I was mowing, all the reasons why I hate mowing the lawn came flooding back to me. Only I realized that mowing the lawn now is way crappier than it ever was when I was a kid.

Why is it crappier now you ask? Because for whatever reason, my husband has a self- push mower instead of a self-propelled mower. Not only that, our lawn mower doesn't have a bag on it to catch the grass. So guess where the grass goes?? Wherever the heck it wants!! It gets everywhere!! All over the sidewalk, all over the driveway, and it clumps up in little piles all over the lawn, which I think makes the "nice" lawn mowing job look sloppy. I never understood why Mitch thinks mulching is so great; all it does is leave little piles of grass everywhere.

I'm sure my neighbors all had a good laugh at me tonight. I literally had to get a running start to push the mower up the little hill that is our front yard. I seriously felt like the biggest pansy. It got me thinking though ... Growing up I had friends who would say, "I don't have to mow the lawn because I'm a girl so my parents don't make me." I was always so jealous. As the only girl in my family (besides my mom of course), I wasn't excluded from much of the hard physical labor. I remember fertilizing the ENTIRE acre so the grass would grow for the horses. I remember getting lectured from my dad on the "proper" way to sweep the garage (use the little broom first to go around the edges, THEN use the big broom with short, swift sweeps to make a pile in the middle, THEN sweep it up in the dust pan). Honestly, I think the only hard physical thing I was excused from on account of my gender was digging irrigation ditches. I don't mean to make my parents sound like slave drivers; they weren't. They just taught us how to work hard. And while we didn't get allowance, we pretty much got whatever we wanted, but not in a spoiled-brat sort-of-way of course. We learned to work hard and my parents did as much as they could for us without spoiling us. And I must say I am very grateful for that now.

While I still hate mowing the lawn, especially with a self-push mower, I am glad that my parents didn't excuse me from those jobs because I'm a girl. I think it's important to learn the value of hard, physical work, boy or girl.

Plus, because I can start a lawn mower, I was able to get the leaf blower going so I could complete the extra step of removing the grass from the sidewalk and driveway, which, I must add, would not be necessary if there was a bag on the stinking lawn mower! I know Mitch hates throwing the grass in the garbage can because it fills it up really fast and it makes it stink, but we can get an extra garbage can for only twenty bucks a year, or something like that. Or there are some horses down the street whom I'm sure would LOVE some fresh cut grass to nibble on.

Whew, I feel much better now that I've let that all out. If Mitch wants to push the mower uphill, then more power to him. I want a self-propelled mower though. With a bag on it. I think we need to invest. But there is a positive to the self-push mower ... I don't have to do my arm workout at the gym tomorrow.