My Secret Shame

    In the  spring, when others' fancies turn to rebirth and renewal, mine turn to introspection and self- discipline.  I belong to a tribe of men who share a serious existential problem. Mother Nature doesn't like us. Not one bit.
    I have learned this cosmic truth in a succession of suburban yards.  My first,  years ago,  had been owned by a retired couple with a passion for flower gardening. Friends asked me gingerly if I -- a neophyte -- really meant to tackle the care of it on my own.  With grand assurance I told them I did indeed.
    Foolish me.  Mother Nature quickly brought me to heel.  Shrubs that had thrived for years sickened when my shadow fell across them.  Hardy leaves grew odd tumors.  Blossoms wilted mysteriously overnight.   My visits for advice at nurseries occasioned impromptu staff meetings and murmurs of puzzled amazement.
    Over the years I've had similar luck with lawns.  They defy my every effort. If one corner thrives, another withers. I have been host to the United Nations of weeds.  My yard care has had the single virtue of consistency.  Through many years and five states I have replicated one result.  Picture corn stubble.
     We outcasts of Mother Nature are a tribe of secret shame.  We recognize each other by the look in our eyes.  However, our shame has nothing to do with a sense of failure. We are perfectly happy for our egos to shelter in the mastery of some other skill -- in a facility for card games, say, or a way with hammers and saws; in a knack with dogs or a flair in the kitchen. In these modern times the definition of manliness has acquired enough scope to offer us a variety of havens.
     No, our shame is of a moral sort.  Our affliction causes us to resent perfectly decent people
     A man who lived near one of my homes was both a neighbor and a friend.   A fine fellow all around.  Good company and a solid citizen. We shared drinks and fun, and serious conversation, too. I was glad to know him.
    And I lived in fear of his discovering that I ground my teeth whenever I looked in the direction of his house and yard.  They were a portrait of perfection.  The grass was a carpet.  The trees were manicured. He maintained this Eden with scarcely any effort.  In the Spring, he sprinkled a little of this and that.  His plants prospered. In the fall, when he blew away leaves, they stayed where he put them.  Every one. Year-round, he achieved in minutes what I labored at for hours without a scrap of proper result. I cherished my friend in fellowship but hated him his yard.
    Another friend in another town had only to gesture and Mother Nature danced.  He grew his own herbs. His tomatoes thrived.  The first time I tried to grow tomatoes, the family dog plucked them from the vine at secret times of her own mysterious devising.  I contrived to have this friend visit my house more often than I visited his.  He never seemed to notice the manipulation.
    Nonetheless, we humans are a hopeful lot. We endure, and sometimes through endurance we prevail.  At length I decided that I need not be forever exiled from harmony with the natural world.  I would feed birds.  As this involved no expectation that seeds would actually germinate, it seemed a reasonable undertaking.
    I had not reckoned on squirrels. They were so many and so hungry that the cost of birdseed became a noticeable item in my monthly budget.  They devised acrobatic means of defeating squirrel-proof feeders.  They did pause briefly when I laced the birdseed with cayenne pepper.  Then they learned to like it.  They could have been tasters at a Cajun cooking contest.
    Squirrels still harass me, and I still harass them. A while back, in a naive spasm, I planted pansies.  The squirrels ate the blossoms. I now possess an arsenal of chemical repellents. All natural, the labels tell me.  All vile, my nose tells me.  The squirrels watch until I forget to spray.  Then they dine.
   Ours is a relationship of sorts, even with its overtones of guerrilla warfare. I persist because it just doesn't seem right for a man to be totally excluded from involvement with the natural world.  It doesn't seem -- well, natural for all the territory beyond my window panes to be a foreign land.
    In every other regard my life skills are simple but solid. I do a good job of cleaning a bathroom. I can tell a decent joke.  Small children seem to like me.
    And I have learned, I believe, to carry with grace the burden of my guilt.  To soldier on.  I can smile serenely through the longest discussion of horticultural success. Others do not glimpse my inner struggle. I am a rock.
    In fact there is a man in my neighborhood who has a perfect yard.  He is also a friend, and ...
    Oh, well.