Moss

Decided to mow the front lawn tonight using the new mower, and set it for the lowest cut. The amount of moss it dragged up out of the lawn horrified me! I'm still trying to work out why front lawns seem more susceptible to moss than back lawns; in our present case, the front lawn is north-facing and often in shade, but that hasn't been true everywhere we've been. Perhaps in recent build houses the soil used under front lawns has been poor, probably the turf poor too - these will have been laid down by the contractors, whereas the back garden has been the responsibility, from the word go, of householders. Probably also the householders themselves have spent more time and effort on the private space of the back garden than the open and more public space at the front of the house.

But anyway, moss is generally a sign of overshading, poor fertility and, more importantly, neglect, when found in a lawn. Because it's green you don't notice too much straight away; the lawn sort of looks all right, especially if all you ever do is walk past it quickly on your way in or out. But in practice, what's happening is that the grass is getting shaded, starved and choked, and the impact is cumulative.

I feel a parable coming on here. For isn't this so true of so much in our lives. We neglect things we ought to tend, we don't notice the steady declines in quality, in ability, in care. And then things start falling apart, and the remedy is probably going to have to be quite a drastic one. Holy Week is for Christians a time for facing up - boldly and honestly - to the truths about ourselves that we spend most of our lives ignoring, just walking past.

Meanwhile, a good chunk of my front lawn is now looking pretty poorly - yellow, sparse and bare. But it's on the way to getting better. Having cleared out the bad stuff, I now need to take the time and trouble to feed and encourage the good.