For the most part, Nick and I love owning our home. It is a privilege and blessing beyond our dreams to own such a beautiful home on a gorgeous, tree lined street, surrounded with diverse array of people and families from all over the world. The schools are excellent, the community is generous and protective, the traffic is manageable.
But, there are days, a few hours here and there, when Nick and I are lying opposite from one another on different couches, staring at the ceiling, ruminating the course of our lives when one of us says the dreaded word. The word that makes the other close their eyes in frustration. The word that quiets the house with a its four syllable funeral bells:
PACH Y SAN DRA
Landscaping. Overgrown. Weeding. Pruning. Whatever you want to call it.
I call it aesthetic mush. I have absolutely no investment whatsoever in landscaping, but here, in our beautiful community that loves trees, greenery, bushes, wild flowers, top soil, and a pair of worker gloves, landscaping is the outlying nuisance of homeownership which Nick and I have yet to adopt as our own. We, literally, have been ignoring our landscaping. Maybe it’s denial. Maybe it’s because we’re hoping that one of these thunderstorms will send lightning down on our front lawn and burn the Pachysandra. Struck down from God. Similar to the Big Butter Jesus on I75 that was crisped to its skeleton last month.
So, last night, Nick and I finally bit the bullet and asked for a professional landscaper to come over, give us plans, an estimate, and hope. John, our wonderful landscaper, actually had to lift his feet up and over the weeds and vines of our front walk to get to the front door. And that’s with the weight of work boots on his feet. It was embarrassing to say the least.
We stood on the front steps, John, Nick, Isaiah, and I. Even Isaiah was leaning over the see the plans. He probably saw something he could fit into his mouth while Nick and I were leaning to steal a glimpse of the estimate. He explained how pretty the Japanese Maple would be how the blue holly would accent the Seruke Berry and the Taxus would be low maintenance. I nodded, repeatedly, waiting for the bomb.
Bomb diggity indeed.
Later, as we put Isaiah to bed, and went back and forth about the decision, we both came up with the same response: once we do this, we’ll never have to deal with this again. The front lawn, at least.
And this is where I am convinced that certain aspects of homeownership is grossly inflated. More and more research indicates that there is not much of a financial difference between renting and owning a home. Take out the emotional investment, pride of ownership, and exchange it for hassle-free living, being free to roam and move if your career calls for it, and I’d call it an even split.
However, it’s the small things that are making me feel attached to our Tudor-laced utopia. Nick and our friend Brian just added much needed cabinet lights in the kitchen so I don’t feel I am going to cut off my fingers when I am slicing veggies and cooking. We just redid our main bathroom. Our landscaping is soon to have its overdue makeover. And, most importantly, our memories of our first son and growing family is slowly being etched on the walls. That’s irreplaceable. And it’s not about the attachment to home improvements, it’s the process of making a space your own. The living and breaking yourselves into a house that was previously not yours and now has your creative decisions in every room. It makes you slow-footed to move.
Back to the Pachysandra.
We decided to sleep on it through the weekend before we make the phone call. But I know that the decision has already been made. Neither Nick or I is going to the intense hard labor of managing the bodacious weeds that have snaked through our walkway or the persistent vines that crawl up the front bricks of our house. And we’re in the dog house with our neighbors who are too kind to admit otherwise. We’ve backed ourselves into a green corner and it’s time to, literally, dig deep and clean house.