Chapter 1: Zen and the Art of the Riding Lawn Mower

I settled on a podcast about skateboarding. 

Sorry, let me go back a few steps: I bought a house.

Like a lot of people my age, or at a similar point in their career, I found myself lucky enough amongst all the chaos and utter horribleness of what will be known as either the Trump Era or the COVID Outbreak of 2020 to buy a home. With that home has come a lot of what academics and researchers loosely refer to as “adult shit.” You know, the chores that you spend your entire childhood thinking, “I can’t wait to grow up so I don’t have to…” only to find out that adulthood consists mostly of doing those chores.

My wife and I compromised a bit on the newness of the house, because we wanted space. We both grew up in relatively wide open areas out west, myself Montana and she California. Suffice it to say, nearly 15 years living in cramped apartments and we were ready to be away from the exploitative landlords, the “Should I call someone?” moments when you hear someone screaming through the walls, the chewing-gum-and-scotch-tape repair guys and explaining to Amazon that you’re not trying the most obvious scam in the world, you just live in a building where packages disappear regularly.

So like I said, I got a lawn, so I had to buy a lawn mower. 

I can’t lie to you, I was a bit excited. Mowing the lawn was the chore of all chores growing up — we had a little over an acre in Montana, so even with a riding mower, doing a good job took 3-4 hours (that I’d much rather have spent playing Final Fantasy VII or Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater). I dove straight into the forums and the customer reviews and tried to figure out what I could get for my money, and what I’d need for my yard.

The thing about my yard: it’s VERY three-dimensional. The property line out back is probably about level with the roof of the house, the slope descends to the front of the yard. If you look out the front door, you see trees. If you look out the back door, you see a wall of grass. I needed a lawnmower that can climb a mountain.

I settled on a Husqvarna YTH22V46, that’s a 22-horsepower Briggs and Stratton® Intek V-Twin engine with a 46-inch mower and mulching capability (sold separately). I’d read that I’d need at least 22hp to handle my hillside (more on that later), and a 46″ would be small enough to get around trees and my well and that sort of thing, but big enough that it wouldn’t take a year to mow my lawn. And it was the only one in my price range that wasn’t sold out literally everywhere.

An interesting thing about buying a house right now — and please, understand I know exactly how much of an asshole I sound like right now — is that everything takes FUCKING FOREVER. Paint swatches? Two weeks. Replacement windows? Minimum three months, probably four, fingers crossed. A sofa? Maybe next week, maybe next year… how flexible are you on color, style, size and whether or not it comes with someone sleeping on it already? I’m just saying the past two years have been hard on all of us in our own ways.

Back to the lawn mower: I was excited, because I’d had a new revelation. Mowing the lawn is the greatest chore, not the worst. I had a few hours to disconnect from the world, but one that couldn’t be denied (who was ever told “don’t worry about the lawn this week, we can let it grow long”?). Mowing the lawn on a riding mower is performing a vital job, while doing absolutely nothing. It’s Schrödinger’s Chore.

Anyway, I settled on a podcast about skateboarding.

It was an older episode (somehow, I’m the only person who’s listened to fewer podcasts since quarantine than before), but I quickly accepted that I’d never understand a word they were saying over the engine’s quiet, constant roar. I was getting some mumbly ASMR vibes from guys talking about kickflips, feeling out the quirks of my new whip and trying to figure out the steeper parts of my lawn. 

It didn’t take long until I found what athletes call “The Zone” and rhythm sections call “The Pocket.” It was like when you’re laying with your eyes closed and you’re not feeling the air or your sheets, but you feel this sort of fuzzy, two-magnets-repelling-one-another feeling, like for a brief moment you’re here on earth but you can feel that you’re not. I wasn’t operating a machine to cut the grass, I was cutting the grass. I wasn’t using a lawn mower, I — me, myself — was mowing the lawn.

I was a benevolent destroyer, encouraging the praying mantis and grasshoppers to move out of the way. “Jump to the short grass and you’re safe,” I’d tell them as I Ferngully’d the tall grass of my newly purchased property. “I’ll be done in like an hour.”

Chapter 2: The Hellion

“I think with the front and the back, it’s probably four hours, maybe five.”

“How are we going to handle that?”

“It’s just going to be a quarter of my weekend, every weekend, forever.”

“What? That’s a hobby.”

“No,” I said in a way usually reserved for when I have to explain Skateboarding to Civilians, “it’s a lifestyle.”

I had taken a break after the front lawn, to wash my hands and have a beer and get rid of the slight disorientation and numbness that comes from being jostled and shaken by a gas engine between your knees for an hour or two. 

I’d conquered the front yard, which is a mostly flat, relatively easy area to navigate, even for someone who hasn’t ridden a mower in nearly two decades. The back yard, on the other hand, is practically all hillside, and full of trees. It looks great, but it has just enough “lawn” area that I can’t say, “It’s the woods, not my problem! The squirrels will fix it, or something.”

As much as I hoped and wished, there was no way this would be a normal mowing job, and there was no way it’d go easy. This needed more than a podcast reduced to murmuring beneath engine noise. I needed something to help me power through my new combination of off-roading and lawn care. I went back to an old standby when I was coding emails for a PAC during the 2016 election: “Screaming for Vengeance” by Judas Priest.

It didn’t take long for my tires to lose grip, and each lap around the hill required a more elaborate second loop to keep the mower from sliding out of control, or worse, flipping over with me on it. Two or three times, I had to take a full lap to the front yard, because I found myself stuck on a hillside I couldn’t get up. By the end, almost every corner or turn required a long extended turn — think something like knights jousting, but without any of the excitement or armor.

But I did it! Aside from one extremely steep part I’d have to revisit, I’d managed the trees and stumps and inclines and slippery new tires and just needed to get across the yard and down to the garage.

Then I ran out of gas. 

I ran out of gas? Motherf– I ran out of gas?? What kind of fucking idiot… I ran out of gas. I found this out the hard way, while trying to wiggle my way out of one of those hills I couldn’t get up (and thanks to an awful fence I can’t wait to remove, couldn’t drive straight down).

What do I do now? I can’t leave the mower out here in the yard, threatening to tip over any minute, while I run to the gas station with my (now obviously) undersized gas can. 

I’d have to move it myself.

Using a tree as both leverage and a backstop, I pushed and positioned the tractor so it was pointed downhill, away from any fences trees or other obstacles that would prevent my sick downhill run to the garage door. You see, I’ve been skateboarding since I was about 15, and snowboarded most of my childhood, so I know how to spot a line, and I spent the better part of my teens and twenties playing in bands, so I’ve carried a few bass cabs up some pretty gnarly steps (RIP Velvet Lounge). 

If I could rest the lawn mower against the tree to catch my breath (and take some stress off the parking brake), I could possibly push the lawn mower a foot or two up the hill, turn the wheels, jump on and ride that shit to the garage like Calvin and Hobbes in a little red wagon. Hopefully with fewer cliff jumps, but I’d take what I could get. 

I heaved and ho’d, I ducked low so my hips and not my lower spine would take the brunt of the lift. So far, so good. The mower has technically crashed head-on into the tree, but with enough guidance that the damage is minimal. (I had to put the engine hood back in position, it was fine.)

I wedged myself between the tree and the front of the mower. This would be either my shining moment, or a very stupid trip to the emergency room. No going back now. I pushed hard, turned the wheel, and jumped onto the lawn mower. I missed the first tree — holy shit, I’d made it into the seat and was steering — and had a clear shot to the driveway. Each branch I ducked, each root and rock I bounced off, I was ready to be ejected to my imminent death. I bounced so high out of my seat that the seat tried to come with me. 

But almost as quickly as I’d jumped over and onto it, there I was sitting in front of the garage door. I’d made it out alive, the lawn was cut in all the important parts, and despite all of the stupidity and terrible odds, I’d managed to bomb down the hill in my back yard without either killing myself or destroying my brand-new mower’s transmission. 

I had conquered the land, conquered the mower, conquered death herself. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I need a beer.