Spoiled by silence

Usually Fridays are awful around here from morning til late afternoon as everyone on the block, except us, has the mowing/leaf blowing crew going on.

Even in times of recession, it seems, people are obsessed about their lawns.

Our lawn is okay. We have not really put down any fertilizer, yet. It’s green. It has purple clover in it, which I kind of like. It is not perfectly trimmed, perfectly edged, sodlike and soft as carpet. But it’s a decent-looking enough lawn. We don’t spray all kinds of stuff on it, and we’re not obsessed.

The clover-y grass under our shady tree

More importantly, we do not spend a lot of time inflicting noise on the neighborhood. We do not attempt to rid our immediate area of every errant twig and clipping by blowing into the street (or into someone else’s yard) with a deafening leaf-blower, all while wearing noise-canceling earphones.

This is not me or anyone I know

Since yesterday, my neighbor has been having something done on his property. It involves large, rumbly trucks that never turn off, sledgehammers on cement, and a bit of call-and-response.

It’s only 10 AM and it’s been going on for hours, already. I grumble through my coffee. My sweet dog hides under my desk and wonders if I’m going to share the bagel.

I may finally take my laptop on the road, and hightail it out of here, if it doesn’t end, soon.

It seems I really have been spoiled by silence.

But since silence is what we do not have today, how about a Mashup of U2 and John Mayer? Seems appropriate – my neighbor’s rumbly trucks seem stuck in a moment, and I’m waiting for it all to change.