I Haaaave a Dreeeaaammm...

How did you read the title?  With a strong, vibrant voice full of passion and hope?  Or was it more like the ABBA song?

Regardless, I do have a dream, of sorts, and it involves the jungle I call a yard.

The first part of the dream is that it no longer look like a jungle.  That may take a minute, as Someone is the yard and garden person in this family and he's, umm...kinda in jail right now, which puts a crimp on the whole yard work thing for him.  I loathe yard work entirely and will, in fact, hug the shade and coolth of the air-conditioned Casa at every opportunity when the weather turns hot.  Which it already has.  80 degrees Fahrenheit is about as high as I like to climb on the thermometer.  After that?  I'll be inside until the next frost, if it can be helped.

So de-jungling (yes, spell check, that is TOO a word - I just made it up) falls to me, and I find myself woefully unprepared for it.  There's the whole weeding thing - you have to bend over and pull those suckers up, and bending?  In public?  Outside? Where people can see?  And probably point, laugh, and offer to rent that advertising space?  Yeah...no.  Still, it needs doing.

And then there's the watering.  Well, I can't complain about that - I have a marvelous sprinkler that is adjustable in several ways and has a timer, so all I have to do is turn a dial and turn on the hose, and the garden (and only the garden) gets watered.

What about mowing?  I'm thinking I need a goat.  I could milk it and make soap or something, and it probably wouldn't break down as often as the mowers have around here.  Seriously, Casa de Crazy kills lawn mowers at an alarming rate!  Push mowers, riding mowers, mowers of every sort, they come here to die.  The only mower that is still moderately workable is the reel mower, and?  I am in no shape to much about with that thing.  It damn near kills Someone to use it.  Me?  I wouldn't mow an inch before I was done for a month.  So right now I haven't realistically got the means to mow, and I think I see and hear things rustling in the grass.  For all I know a giraffe has escaped from some menagerie somewhere and is happily ensconced in my yard.

The second part of the dream involves making less lawn, more garden (or "edible estate", as I've heard them called) and maybe wildflower meadow and possible even orchard in the distant future.  Casa de Crazy sits on a 3/4 acre lot, which doesn't sound like much but it looks huge to me, and I figure the part that isn't wooded could be useful for something besides creating hernias and causing heat rash.  I'm thinking a few fruit trees and some berry bushes, and a new strawberry bed that isn't quite as chaotic as the current one would all be nice.  I don't plan to live here forever, but I don't mind leaving something nice behind for the next person, either.

Third comes the outdoor living part.  We have a couple of really nice outdoor tables, one of which has matching chairs.  Right now they're sort of planted out in the grass, forlornly wondering why no one ever uses them.  As long as I'm spending the lottery money, I would like a stone paver patio out front, and a little fire pit and seating area around the side.  Around the other side, a greenhouse wouldn't hurt my feelings.  While I may not like being hot and sweaty, I would probably spend a lot more time outdoors if I didn't have to worry about being eaten by whatever lives in our personal Serengeti.

Before anything, though, I guess I will have to remove the junk that has accumulated all around the yard and house.  We may have a packrat or two living here, and they've gathered up some impressive items.  Impressive, that is, if you judge more by weight or size rather than actual, you know, usefulness.  There's the refrigerator that could double as a bus.  The collection of bits and pieces of I-don't-know-what.  The riding lawnmower huddled under some kind of cover, defunct and bewildered as to why it deserved such a fate.  The portable fireplace/grill that I adore but has lost a leg and now has to be propped against the arm of one of my metal chairs if I want to use it.  The chair arm is the perfect height, by the way, but this makes the fireplace/grill rather less than portable and the chair rather less than sit-able.  There are a few million plastic cat litter buckets kept because...umm...why?  Oh, yeah - they make good planters in case we run out of the thousand black pots in the garage.

Groan.

There is a lot to do, and even on a good day I can't do most of it.  I have to try, though.

Do you think the neighbors would call the loony bin on me if I try to clip the grass with kitchen shears?