I have always hated grass in all of its non-smokable forms.

In Akron in 1969, the sneaky old woman, who gave birth to me, challenged my 7-year-old manhood and said I wasn’t “strong enough” to push the mower.

15 minutes later and I unwittingly sold myself into a decade of middle-class-white-slavery.

I had to mow an acre of thick green rye shit with a 21-inch wide used lawn boy.

That piece of crap mower was so under-powered and dull, sometimes I had to get out the hand scythe like a miniature grim reaper to make the first cut.

I moved 2000 miles away so I wouldn’t have to mow that fucking lawn again. Welcome to Phoenix, 7 inches of rain a year – no chance of a lawn here. Then I met the Bear. She grew up in Arizona, and after we were married for 2 years, I learned she loved grass and not the fun kind.

She turfed our first house. 15 fucking trips to Home Depot in 100-degree weather to pick up the extra thick hybrid sod, haul it, and lay it down. It looked like Ohio back there. Fuck. 4 more years of mowing with an underpowered used tiff mower.

There were times I wished she had listened to the Investigation Discovery channel and just killed me. But do it on a Thursday or Friday before I have to mow that fucking lawn again.

Then we moved, and the next house had another yard full of green itchy shit. This time it was a crappy thin Bermuda grass. Did I mention I’m allergic to grass — yeah makes mowing an extra pain in the ass as your sneezing, coughing and scratching the skin off your shins, forearms and using both hands to scratch your face.

Don’t get me started on the ant piles and dog shit that accompany any lawn, and the fucking cheap ass leaky sprinkler system that’s always a muddy mess working “below” my feet and sending my back into spasms.

Finally, the Boy was old enough to take over — the Bear made me wait until he was 10. But that manipulative little shit always seemed to get out of mowing. There was the summer he almost lost his leg and couldn’t mow because he was getting 9 surgeries. Com’on pussy. In my day, I learned how to mow on crutches (4 knee surgeries).

Eventually, I turned the water off and let the grass go brown.

Within months, The Bear decided I was a useless idiot and fixed the sprinkler system herself and started watering again.

Water that starts somewhere in Colorado or Wyoming and makes its way down river for 800 miles, where Arizona pulls it out and runs it 300 miles across the desert so we can dump it on a useless, sick-looking, itching, sharp, bullshit Bermuda lawn. Awesome use of resources.

I showed the Bear the documentaries on the Colorado River and the pictures of the drying out of Lake Mead and Powell.

“If I get someone else to mow, can I water the lawn,” she said.

“Yes.” You gotta pick your battles people. It’s me or water for the next generation. And just like all of you fuckers, I’m picking me.

Last year, the Bear spent 20k on a new backyard. We killed the grass, covered it with a large patio of concrete pavers, a small patch of fake turf and new rock over the rest. It was awesome.

But this spring, the goddamn demon Bermuda is growing through the rocks and crevasses. Round-up was just found to be more toxic to humans than previously thought. But fuck-it, every weekend I’m spraying a ton of that shit on those little Bermuda shoots. It’s me or the grass.

This summer — we kill the fucking turf in the front yard. After almost 50 years of lawn care, I’m almost free. Free I tell ya… Green grass — KISS MY ASS!