I hate lawns. After we bought this house, we killed the grass in the back yard and covered it with bark chips. Then we tore up all the sod on half the front yard and planted it with a vegetable/flower garden and rock path. Then tore out all the sod on the side of the house and put in a flagstone walkway. I’m 69. Sick “old men” in your pipe and do whatever comes unnaturally.
Where else are you gonna put the swing set, or the slip’n’slide? D’uh.
This. Kids like having lawns to play on. Maybe get up a touch football game going or kick a soccer ball around. Play Frisbee with the dog. Parents set up swing sets and sand boxes in the back yard. Maybe set up a wading pool or put out a Slip 'n Slide. Or just lying around and rolling in the grass. It’s like going to the park without leaving home. Every house had a lawn, and they were full of kids playing on them. Lawns were important to kids growing up in suburbia like me.
Wow, what a sweeping insult.
I’d say that yes, older people do spend more time/effort on their lawns - and by “older” I mean “retired.” As a general rule, they have more free time, so can devote it to hobbies. For many a lawn or garden is a hobby (and was when they were younger). Something they enjoy maintaining - out in nice weather, and you can see the results of your labors, so you get positive reinforcement (same for comments from visitors/friends). When you don’t have to devote 40 hour a week to work, and when you don’t have kids to take care of, you have more time. Of course, nowadays, people don’t get their kids out of the house at as young an age, due either to children staying longer because of rising-expenses in housing and education or because they had their children at an older age.
In answer to the OP.
My experience is that old men like lawns is because after they’ve mowed it, they have an excuse to sit down in the sun and have a beer.
I take the entirely opposite vew… old people are overusing water, draining the resources of future generations (similar to Social Security and Medicare), using excess petrochemicals (fertilizer, weedkiller) and gas (mowing, and yard waste hauling). In addition to the lawn acting as a symbolic defensive barrier. Our yard growing up as a kid was torn to shreds by the bikes and the ball games- similar to this GenXer/Millenial’s lawn now. “Hey kids, come on over and play on my yard. It’s all yours too.”
I may not mow often enough (need some grass to cushion any tackles), but I shovel the whole neighborhood as safety is far more important than my weed situation on my neighbors’ house value.
Prize for the dumbest post of the day.
Married woman here, 41. I am the one in charge of our small lawn - and while I don’t obsess about it, I yearn for a much larger expanse of real estate than what we have. Just mowing, now watering or fertilizing. I like being outside, why wouldn’t I like having my own space outside to be in? Woods would be even better though. Big yard + lots of woods would be the bestest of all, though.
I come from a long line of farmers and gardeners, so I blame genetics. I like having a decent yard and gardens. It’s also in the interest of being a good neighbor. I find it interesting when I see a 250k house and it’s obvious they spent about $200 max on landscaping.
Lawns were invented in the 1800s by rich people showing off how much land and labor they could waste.
You have to spend more time on the lawn because you’re older and slower, and because you don’t want some HOA puke giving you a ticket because your lawn doesn’t meet their standards.
We are older guys, and our lawn is about 33% weeds. But it’s green and we keep it trimmed. We never fertilize or water, and we love dandelions. And if someone walked on our lawn, we wouldn’t yell at them.
Not old quite yet, but I am in a townhouse and pay the HOA to take care of the property. The neighborhood looks great. There is grass enough, a park across the street, and bigger homes than mine down the street all the way to the golf course. Sometimes we play ladderball or other lawn toss kinds of games on the front lawn. Sometimes I sit out there with a drink and watch the sunset, yakking on the phone. There is a big ash tree in front of my place which looms in my front windows that I like to look at literally every day. The lawn makes my home that much nicer, that’s all.
Guys also like “fenced-in areas”.
http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/fenced-in/2860783
In a few months I’ll be 65, which I think already qualifies me as an “old man”. I do NOT like my lawn. It was never properly cared for and is more of a weed collection.
The funny thing is that this year, I received a violation (two actually) for allowing the grass to grow too high!! (These are the first violations I have ever received!!)
So, do you think I like my lawn?
I’ll close this posting with a Grumpy Old Man “harumphhhhh”!! :mad:
In every neighborhood I’ve lived in an uncut lawn is looked down upon as part of an unkempt house. I currently live in a neighborhood of young and old, white black and Hispanic and 95% of the lawns are kept up regularly. As a matter of fact, a well mowed lawn is as American as apple pie!
The OP question seems out of left field to me. Maybe she was raised in a commune?
Exactly this. Lawns are part of the green space around a property that includes trees and birds, shrubbery, flowers, and other greenery. It’s all part of the natural ambiance that makes a house pleasant to be in and around. I even have occasional bunny rabbits hopping around mine. Lawns don’t necessarily need to be watered because not everywhere is experiencing drought, and if they do, not everywhere is experiencing water shortages. I usually don’t water my lawn anyway and it’s doing fine, though I do water the plants.
What are you going to have if you don’t have a lawn? It’ll either be dirt or paving.
I can’t even understand what the OP is trying to suggest, but it sounds like complete nonsense. The neighborhood I’m in has both young and old people and everyone takes care of their lawns.
Like I said … :rolleyes:
Short answer: I like the way it makes the neighborhood look.
I’m an old suburbanite with a fairly neat lawn. I like the look of well-kept houses in my neighborhood and the lawns are just part of that. I end up doing more lawn work than I’d prefer, but that’s due to the HOA’s watchful eye. I actually prefer our draconian* and somewhat vicious HOA to the alternative (having seen what happens without one), so keeping my lawn spotless is part of that deal.
FWIW: I finally whined enough that mizPullin got me a new lawnmower. His name is Rafael and he comes by every Saturday. Lawn work for me consists of waving at him as I head for the lake.
*I’ve posted about them before, they’ve put liens on two houses for non-compliance recently and (according to neighbors) cost one family over 30K in legal fees.
When I look down my block, there are mostly nice yards and 2 yards that are just overgrown shitholes. Guess which ones aren’t mine? One lady let her yard get grown over until the city wrote her up and sent a crew over to do it, and charged her $500. Her place is next door to the family across the street, and they hate having her as a neighbor. She hasn’t let it go this year so far, I guess that bill got her attention.
There are a pair of sisters who live next door to each other, starting one lot over from my place (I have 3 lots, so plenty of mowing - and I also mow the front yard of the neighbor on the other side) and they both keep immaculate yards - and live directly across from overgrown shithole #2 on the block.
I wouldn’t say I “like” my lawn, but I do like my neighborhood to look nice, and thankfully most of my neighbors seem to agree.
Ok, well, I hate the excessively manicured look. I hate when I see people watering their LAWN, for godssakes. We live in the northeast, so we don’t have water shortages, but people seriously need to be told in California, don’t waste water on your lawn??
I keep mine mowed, but I don’t really care if the mower we hired comes every two weeks or three. I love dandelions. I will never, ever pluck them from the lawn. Their little heads get chopped off by the mower anyway.
I think that annoying buzz of the lawnmower is way more disruptive to peace and quiet in suburbia than a slightly unkempt lawn. I’m not talking about people like in Duke of Rat’s post; just that I don’t need it to be perfect, and honestly don’t like it to be perfect. I love a profusion of wildflowers.