For some reason–perhaps political–Americans became consumed by their front lawns in the middle of last century, looking not out anymore but down, fussing over those essentially useless patches of respectability which require tremendous maintenance and resources. Even when water grows scarce, we still find a way to turn them green–or even plastic. From Syndee Barwick in the Guardian:

“I like most of my neighbors, but the lengths to which they’ll go to keep up with one another and their gusto to transform weeds into ‘flawless’ turf both fascinates and infuriates me.

There is some entertainment value in the spectacle: for instance, the neighbor who sits astride his lawn tractor sans shirt, socks or sneakers – but with a pair of short-shorts that ride up and become harder to spot as the mowing goes one. (A visiting friend once spotted him and shouted, ‘Oh my God! Do you know your neighbor cuts his grass naked?’)

But I am not amused when the stink of another neighbor’s toxic fertilizer application or pesticide treatment invades my house or wafts past as I sit in my backyard. It’s fine if he wants to expose himself to toxic chemicals as part of his ritual worship to the outdoors, but there’s no reason to poison me, too.

Our frenzied love affair with green lawns fuels an industry worth $40bn per year and counting, as estimated by Ted Steinberg in American Green: The Obsessive Quest for the Perfect Lawn – whether you do it yourself or hire help, it takes some serious cash to maintain that perfect green. A quick shopping list: seed, fertilizer, weedkiller, bug killer, more seed, a lawnmower, maintenance for the lawnmower (gas, blade sharpening, storage), a weedwacker and some sort of irrigation system. Money might not grow on trees, but it is, in fact, growing your lawn.

And then there’s the water: according to the Environmental Protection Agency, the average American household uses about 320 gallons of water per day for outdoor use – and more than half of that is for lawns and gardens. Across the US, landscape irrigation alone sucks up one-third of residential water use (most of it on grass). The grand total: 9bn gallons per day.”