Sunday, I mowed the lawn. Mowing the lawn is still a newish thing to me. I never had to do it before I moved here. It was always done by my father or brother when I was growing up. None of the girls had to mow the lawn or take out the trash. My brother, however, had to do as many household chores as we girls. Life is unfair sometimes. I once asked my father if I could mow the lawn and he said no, because he would really rather I grew up with all my body parts intact. This was not a sexist thing, it was a having a spazzy daughter thing. I was also not allowed to cut things with sharp knives while he was around. It made him very nervous and he would take over the job of cutting whatever fruit or veggie I was trying to cut. The sad thing is he still hates to see me use a knife and would probably be horrified if he knew I was mowing the lawn.
Anyway, the thing about Mint Manor is that my landlady lives in her own little house that is in the very back of the yard. We have grape vines that grow lovely bunches of grapes and flowers around the edge that are pretty, we have a rabbit that lives under the shed and spends a great deal of the day taunting the cat. I swear that she does (and it is a she cause this year we had baby bunnies). We also have two garden gnomes on each side of the yard, that is split by the sidewalk leading to her house. They are sitting on matching elephants. I kid not. We also have statues of turtles, little kids with flower baskets, elfs on sticks, swans, rabbits (not the real one! Fake ones!) an alligator, a fountain, a bear, pinwheels, lanterns, ducks and other assorted things. All arranged in two giant squares, on each side of the walk. My landlady loves this stuff and all I can do is stare at it in horror as the stone menagerie grows. The yard is supposed to be mine, but in truth it is not. I hardly ever go out there, which is kind of sad, because I only ever wanted my own backyard. I still mow, cause she is an old lady and it's only right. I do not move the things out of my way anymore. There is just too much of it. I just kind of bash around them.

Oh well....