Mowing Heaven Or Hell
By: Beth Knott
Okay Hands On Women®, here's a little story for you. When I was married and doing all kinds of chores around the house, you know - cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping, laundry, and so on and so on, my Mom said these words to me: "Never mow the lawn, or you'll just add it to the list of the things you have to do. Take my word for it, Honey, play dumb on this one." And that's exactly what I did. It worked fine until I got a divorce, with a house to take care of all by myself. Funny thing...the lawn did NOT stop growing just because I didn't want to start mowing.
I got out the mower and started doing the chore that I had avoided so well. Now, I have over an acre of yard. That's a lot to mow! On top of that, I have a lot of trees, rocks and hills. So the task at hand is neither easy nor quick. For the first summer, I got on the riding mower and mowed as much as I could that way. I then got out the push mower and mowed the extreme hills and around the trees. It wasn't half bad, but I hated every moment of it - and it took most of my weekend to do. On top of that, as mowing season went on, the lawnmower seemed to break down every other time I used it. Net-net, I was spending all kinds of money (and my time is money-make no mistake) on something that I could be paying someone else to do. By the second summer, that's exactly what I did - paid someone else to mow the yard. He brings his crew in, they mow and trim - in and out in less than an hour, and charge me $50 to do it! What a bargain! There's only one catch, their mowers are too big to get through the gate that goes into my dog pen. I've been mowing that part of the lawn with my push mower. No matter what the name implies, that thing is just not that easy to push.
 A couple of months ago, a friend of mine was at the local home improvement center and saw that they were selling reconditioned mowers for about half price. But these weren't just any re-conditioned mowers - these wer e self-propelled mowers! He called me and said that I should come take a look at them. Now, I'm not very mechanical, so I can't give you an expert explanation of how they work, but the basic premise is this: you start the mower, which looks like an ordinary push mower, but there is an extra bar that you squeeze and it makes the mower take off! You might even have a bit of trouble keeping up with it at first. Thankfully, mine featured a speed setting, which provides control over the zoom factor. Just control the direction, and remember to let go of the bar before you run into something!
Since I had already decided that I wanted a new push mower with the larger wheels in the back (those bigger wheels make it easier to maneuver in rough terrain - which I have), this seemed like good choice, and it was on sale. (words that women love) I bought it and brought it home. The first time I gave it a try, I could't elieve th dfference! You still have some work to do, but it cuts the strain down by at least half, and maks the job go much, much fastr! When it comes to mowing lawns, faster is definitely better! The bonus is that if I let the grass get a bit higher than I should, it cuts through that far better than my standard push mower did, since it has mower power. This one also came with a mulching blade, which just puts the clippings back into the yard as fertilizer; or I can attach the bag provided to catch the clippi ngs if I choose.
The mower itself is quite a bit heavier than my old mower, but since it makes the effort far less, I don't care at all! This is a worthy trade-off. Now I'm not going to say that it's actually "fun" to mow the yard, but I will say it's not the slice of pure hell that it felt like before. My advice to you - if you are a Hands On Woman who has a lot of yard, and don't care for (can't really afford) riding moweres, or if you have hills, or just want an easier experience with regular mowing, you might want to consider a self-propelled mower. It made my life a little easier, which is all I can ask for!
Happy Mowing! 
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