It’s 7:42 AM on a Saturday and someone is already mowing their stupid fucking lawn.
And it’s only the middle of June, which means there are a solid 3+ more months of this ahead. I have no idea how I’m going to survive yet another summer in Northern Hellville, comprised of insufferable 24/7 noise pollution; heat and humidity; dodging bikers + trying to stay out of jail; droves of humanity on all the nearby trails and pretty much everywhere; mosquitoes and spider bites (they love my blood). My own personal hell.
I roll onto my back, after turning on my white noise machine, but it’s too late: the drone, drone, droning is already in my brain and I won’t be able to go back to sleep now. In fact, I will be hearing lawn mowers all day, well into the night, even after they’ve finally ceased. I don’t know if that is caused by the anxiety or something else – I call it an auditory hallucination – but it’s horrible. Imagine your worst, most triggering noise, then imagine it gets stuck in your brain, and you hear it even as you’re trying to fall asleep. Hours after it stopped. Thank God for Ambien but that is not without its own problems. I’m at a loss here, because I am stuck, so very stuck, in a vicious and ruthless loop, without end, Monday through Sunday. And again and again and again. And there is truly no respite in sight. Even as I type this, hours after the initial rude awakening, there is another lawn mower going. And this is after suffering through commercial mowers all week long. How ANYONE’s yard still needs to be cut at this point in the week is beyond my literal comprehension!!!!!!
Some days, my reality so closely mirrors that of my previous life, that it bends my brain – how can this be, I think? Most of the time, it is very triggering; the only difference between present and past being that I’m not slowly poisoning myself and numbing my existence – or creating a plethora of additional problems for myself. But the similarities are striking because I’m STILL stuck, where I’ve been for the past close to 10 years. (And I’m STILL dealing with round-the-clock noise pollution and dangerous run-ins with bikers and honking at people when they fly through a stop sign. Nothing’s changed). And I don’t know how to get out – literally or figuratively. In some ways, it’s almost worse because I’m finally awake to all of this bullshit and I’m not numbing it anymore or drinking myself into an oblivion in order to escape some of the (literal) noise. So I can see it for everything that it is and I’m SO TIRED of putting up with it! Where is the HOA and why aren’t they enforcing quiet hours? Where are all the cops when you need them? Why is the W&OD Trail a fucking free-for-all? Why can’t bikers respect the lane boundaries and give runners some space? I could go on and on. And summer is the worst of all, as it is not only my least favorite season no matter where I am, but because of the personal hell I went through trying to get sober in summer 2020. So when you add that to everything I mentioned above and then you light it on fire – I’m looking at you, August – yes, I dread this season yearly and always will. (But I am hopeful that eventually I will live somewhere where I can actually hear myself think, as bleak as that possibility seems now).
Each day, I get a little closer to completely snapping. Sometimes I think I’ve already lost my mind. I will hand it to myself that I’ve been working tirelessly to be as resourceful as possible and make the most of the shituations (shitty situations). I’ve created new coping mechanisms for myself: trying to run really early and/or late – or in nearby neighborhoods versus on the W&OD; attempting to leave early enough to “avoid traffic” when I go to the grocery store or other errands and not go at peak hours; parking my car at a central location and then walking to finish errands, so as to avoid additional time on the road and in parking lots – more on that in the next paragraph, and so on and so forth. I certainly go to great lengths to avoid people, more than ever before, because I am so completely burned out and drained and incapable of dealing with any of this bullshit any longer. I am just one rude asshole away from slamming my car into theirs or who knows what else. Because, again, this is how it’s been for YEARS, with no break and none in sight. In many ways, my attempts to “avoid” people/traffic/etc. (though there is no way to avoid them altogether, unfortunately) is also self-preservation and protection, including trying to protect OTHERS from my rage and short fuse. It would be slightly more manageable (but just ever so slightly) if it was just ONE thing: if it was only the noise pollution and I had a quiet place to escape to on the weekends, maybe that dream cabin in the woods, I might be able to get through a few more months of this. If the crews only worked Monday through Friday and then it was quiet on the weekends, I could live with that, too, probably. But it’s not – and it bears repeating that this is years and years of the same incessant, round-the-clock “Lawn Locusts” plus absolute insanity on the road that is just getting worse (people need to stop moving here – and stop procreating) and nearly dying every time I set foot on the heavily, heavily trafficked W&OD, which seems to always be home to a Tour de France training session.
What irritates me the most about everything I have described to this point is the unfairness of it all. That inconsiderate asshole mowing his dumb grass that no one cares about except him: did he check the time before he revved up his noisy machine? I doubt for a second he did – just like no one seems to think twice before running a red light around here or cutting you off while switching lanes or plowing through a four-way intersection. And the bikers don’t care about the runners; in fact, I read somewhere that this year will be worse than ever before because they’re after that fresh, fresh runner blood. (No, not really, but a little humor helps me to refrain from throwing my laptop across the room). These supercilious suburbanites hire lawn companies and don’t give a crap that they frequently commence their yard work before 8 AM, which is still technically within the (completely disregarded) quiet hours. And those who don’t have a crew come Monday through Friday are the ones who start working in their yards before 8 AM on a Saturday. Tomorrow it will be something else: maybe another lawn mower or a leaf blower (the bane of my existence and truly deserving of its own post and for sure a letter to my congressman) or a power washer. Sunday should be observed as a day of rest and of quiet, religion aside, but it is not. Certainly not in Northern Hellville, the noisiest, most insufferable layer of Dante’s inferno. And then the traffic and parking lots: has anyone else noticed that people cut diagonally through parking lots more than ever before?! It doesn’t seem to happen at smaller lots such as Whole Foods but in larger strip malls (picture one with a Giant, a CVS, and a Michael’s), these idiots go flying through THE MIDDLE of the lot – I’m talking through actual parking spots – without so much as glancing to their left or right. It has gotten to the point where I am very afraid for my safety and I am almost always worried about getting hit or being involved in an accident.
I’m also afraid for the next few months: how am I going to survive YET ANOTHER miserable summer here in suburban purgatory?! I feel I have exhausted all of my options, save for physically leaving and moving away – but unfortunately that is not in the cards right now, so I am literally stuck. I’m at a complete loss – and I often wonder if anyone else struggles with this, too. I cannot be the only person in Northern Hellville that is fit to be tied over everything I just mentioned. (Or maybe everyone is just completely immune to it by this point, because it’s so normalized to almost die when you go to the grocery store or to suffer from constant ringing in your ears because the noise pollution never ceases. That is a little frightening). I know it could be worse – I’m not fearing for my life; well, sort of – and I will cling to the things that keep me somewhat sane-ish in the meantime, because it’s the only way to stay out of a mental institution – but could I PLEASE get a break?!? Just ONE DAY, one measly day, a week with no noise pollution. And PS – in case this wasn’t obvious – no one gives a SHIT about your stupid grass.