Keeping Up with the Joneses

I guess I do a lot of braggin' in this blog, but that's ok. Blogs just seem to bring out the braggart in people, and better that I do my braggin' here than in public. What would you rather have - a blog talking a bunch of bull or some windbag sitting next to you on an airplane talking your ear off. Yeah, you know what I mean.

Anyways, I want to talk about the lady up the street with the perfect yard. I don't know if I've ever mentioned her before and I'm embarrassed to say I've never really met her, but even if you don't know her I'm sure you know who she is. She's the fifty-ish one who's always doddering about her yard with her gardening gloves and floppy hat, snipping and digging at all hours of the day, and keeping everything so perfectly neat and trim that the place looks damn near antiseptic.

And if it sounds as if I hate her, I really don't. Fact is, I kind of admire her in a way. She puts her heart and soul into that yard of hers and all things being equal it's probably the best looking yard in the neighborhood (except for the yard next door to mine, but that doesn't count. See, the people next door had their yard professionally landscaped and they have a gardener who comes out once a week and keeps it up for them. To me that's the nothing more than a "store-bought" yard and not the same as a yard that someone has put their sweat and blood into. There's a fundamental difference between a yard that's the fruit of your own labor and a yard that you bought at Sears, and if you don't understand that then it's time to fire your gardener and get a little dirt on your hands.)

But I digress.

Where was I? Oh yeah, I was talking about my roses. I know I've talked about my roses before and how, despite my best efforts, my rose bushes are the sorriest looking ones on the block. Or should I say, used to be the sorriest ones on the block, but that's all changed now. Let me try to explain.

For the longest time I couldn't figure out why my rose bushes always looked so scraggly and barren until one morning I was walking across my yard and noticed a pile of deer scat (or poop, as it's more commonly known) on the lawn. Aha, I thought, could this be the solution to the mystery of the roses? I set out to investigate and sure enough, about a week later I walked out in the front yard one night and saw two deer, a doe and a fawn, sniffing around my rose bushes.

So off I went to the local hardware store to look for a deer repellant and I found this wonderful stuff called Liquid Fence. And when I say wonderful I'm talking about the results, not the smell. To tell the truth this stuff smells awful - kind of like a dead body or an outhouse that's gone to seed, but it works great. The deer get one sniff of Liquid Fence and they pretty much lose their apetite for roses.

And now the results, I'm happy to say, after much watering and feeding and spraying and pruning are (here comes the braggin' part) the best looking rose bushes you ever did lay your eyes on. Ever! I'm talking whites and pinks and deep ruby reds on bushes so healthy and full of blooms that it almost make a fella' wish he was dead just so he could be buried under 'em. I tell you it's a wonder to me why Sunset Magazine hasn't given me a call to ask me how I did it.

Which brings me to the lady up the street. Tonight I was out doing some late evening pruning when she drove past the house and glanced at my yard the way she sometimes does in that sort of neighborly but slightly condescending manner of hers. I was expecting the usual friendly wave before she turned away and drove on down the street, but instead I saw something different when she turned and looked at my roses tonight. I can't exactly describe it as shock, and it certainly wasn't awe, but it was something and I couldn't quite figure it. Then it struck me and a big grin just broke out inside because I finally realized...

She was jell-ous.

Yeah, I know you think I'm just braggin', but I'm telling you that for at least one brief moment the perfect yard lady was jealous of my roses. And I mean isn't that what it's all about, really. All the laboring and the fussing over our yards. Isn't it there somewhere in the back of your mind when your sitting there sweating in the hot summer sun, that if you just keep at it and keep on going that someday you'll be the envy of your neighbors. C'mon, you mean to tell me that's never crossed your mind. That little thought that says "Neener, neener, neener...my yards better than your yard." It isn't? Well then maybe next time don't buy your yard at Sears.

But just to show you that I'm really not the braggart you think I am, that I am, in fact, really quite humble at heart, let me add as a final thought that as proud as I am of my roses, the perfect yard lady still has the best yard in the neighborhood.

And yeah, I'm a little jell-ous too.