Sunday, September 03, 2006

re-evaluation

Oscar and I faced a bit of reality last night, It was a long time coming. When we moved here, one of the things I loved most was the yard. It's huge for the size of the house, and compared to most city lots. I was slow, but able to get pretty much everything done I wanted. Hell, I put in 7 flower beds the first year.
Now I can't do it. I can't even mow the lawn anymore, and the thing is, although Oscar appreciates the produce (berries) and the beauty, he has almost no interest in caring for the yard or garden. To be honest, his arthritis has worsened enough that it is a painful thing for him, too, if not as debilitating as it is for me.
For me, although the pain is worth it, the lameness and medical difficulties caused by bending are not worth the joy I get from gardening any more. Health first, right? For him, since he doesn't have the love of it, the pain is DEFINATLEY too much to pay for caring for the yard.

So last night we discussed the possibility of moving into a *gulp* planned community. I HATE the idea of being so 'cheek by jowl' with neighbors. But I hate more the idea of having a yard and garden we can't care for. I know I can feed my love of gardening with container plants on the patio and plants inside in a sun room. If we move to the south west, we could have the privacy and just have a Xeriscape in the yard. That would be the best. But it looks like that won't happen for 3-5 or even 10 years yet. I think the best solution would be to go to a planned community that has some Universal Access homes on largish lots, (or a place we can build one) and that has yard service available (for a fee) Surely there is somewhere like that out there? It is a daily sadness to me to look out at the yard and see what needs doing, and not be able to do it. So, we'll start looking into possibilities. We don't plan to move for quite a while (we are refinancing the house this month) but it will be comforting to be able to find that there are places out there with privacy and space, and yard care that we may be able to afford.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

You should look at moving down here to San Antonio! Housing is relatively inexpensive here, plus I'm sure you could find a "planned community" here with the yard space to give you a bit of a garden but not overwhelming. San Antonio seems to be the haven of planned communities...

*hugs*

Amyra and Piper

Anonymous said...

In our area, there are lots of townhouse-style condos, where you get just the small yard in front and behind the house, and the yard services are provided by the homeowners association. Would that be an option?

BTW, I'd love to see the newest iteration of the story you were working on now that my horrible summer is over.

*hugs*

Lynx said...

have you considered contacting the local Scout groups? I bet they would love an opportunity to earn their gardening & herbal badges, plus earn community service. Or offer free gardening classes... you teach, they do the work, they learn, everyone is happy.
and best of all, everyone gets something out of the deal so nobody has to feel like "charity"...