Expressway: I fought the lawn, the lawn won

This year's early spring brought the landscapers out in March, and now you can hear the high-pitched whine of Weed Wackers and mowers competing with birdsong every day of the week.

Long Island is the world's lawn-care center, hosting a kind of lawn Olympics as neighbors compete for the green. So the pressure's on. However, after years of struggling to create a carpet worthy of our ubiquitous golf courses, I surrender. My property is near the shore (read, sandy) and abounds with stately trees (shady). I have spent thousands of dollars in the past 20 years to beat my two acres into submission. At last I concede -- the land has won.

It all came to a head last year when I attended a conference on Long Island water quality at the Locust Valley public library. Speakers explained how fertilizers and insecticides are getting into the Long Island Sound, killing shellfish and encouraging algae growth. I guiltily thought of the little stream of stormwater runoff in my backyard that flows into a nearby saltwater marsh that feeds Frost Creek and then Long Island Sound. Besides, after years of aggressive and expensive tactics -- aeration, lime, chemicals and specialized seed -- the lawn has always ended up weedy with brown patches.

The conference left me resolved to turn over a new leaf, and so I called a landscaping company that boasted it provided totally organic lawn maintenance. The owner took a soil sample. A few days later, after analysis, she said calling my yard "soil" was a misnomer. After throwing some seed into the yard's many bald patches, she sat me down for a heart-to-heart. "You have very little grass growing here, and that will never change," she said.

Confused, I looked around at the growth that did exist.

She continued, "What you're looking at is wild onion, moss and lawn berries. The good news is that they are all green. If I were you, I wouldn't bother seeding from now on. Just keep the weeds mowed and watered and most people won't be able to tell the difference between grass and what you've got here."

My initial reaction was shame, but with reflection I've surrendered my dream of a Wimbledon lawn. In fact, I've surrendered the concept of a lawn entirely.

Today I proudly survey my little farm of mock strawberries and wild onions and fantasize about selling my produce at a local farmers' market, or maybe a stand at the head of the driveway. Of course, next year I'll have to rotate my crops, perhaps switching off with clover and dandelions. With that settled, I've turned my attention to the business of those elevated dirt tunnels that turn my property into a Martian landscape, and part two of my new living-off-the-land venture, a petting zoo featuring lawn moles.

The bottom line is, I've come to realize there's nothing natural about growing grass. Well, gotta go. It's time to start building a corral for my mole roundup.