Individualists unite!

By: Sam Reiss

When you’re part of an organized society, it’s understood that there’s a certain price to pay in terms of individuality.

We are obliged, if you want things to work, to adhere to some common laws, to respect common property, to answer to a higher authority, etc. In the case of smaller microcosms of organized societies, such as condo boards and suburban neighbourhoods, it’s necessary at times to extend the list to include such things as hanging a certain colour of blinds or agreeing to keep clown-face welcome mats off the stoop.

Sometimes, these things are functional, as in keeping common laneways free of debris, and sometimes purely esthetic. One story in the Star this week could go either way.

A Scarborough woman is in trouble for turning her front lawn into what she claims is a natural garden. According to the story, Annemarie Leepel has run afoul of the city’s Municipal Code, which states that weeds and grass can’t exceed 20 cm, unless exempted by achieving natural garden status. Leepel has applied for such status and will be heard at a council meeting today.

To qualify as a natural garden, the yard must be intentionally planted and constantly managed; while Leepel did intentionally replace the grass in her front yard with different plants when she bought the house, which takes care of the former requirement, it also contains some plants many consider weeds, and they seem to have been granted free run of the property.

I’ve just one picture to go on, which appeared in the Toronto Star alongside the story, but I’m inclined to side with the city. It looks like nothing much more than a vacant lot gone haywire. Leepel told the Star that no neighbours had said anything to her, but that the city had received complaints, and a few neighbours are quoted in the story saying they don’t mind a more organic look, but wish she’d take better care of it.

The city’s guidelines are iffy at best. A thistle, for example, can be ordered removed if it can spread to a neighbour’s yard or do harm to anyone, but may be allowed to stay if its “purpose” is to attract finches. While the garden does contain some nice elements, such as peonies and Shasta daisies, which actually don’t look too bad even when a bit overgrown, especially in spring, it also contains some dodgy characters most people wouldn’t grow on purpose, like prickly lettuce and pigweed.

How many esthetic rights should you have on your own property? As long as my weeds aren’t blowing seeds into your yard, can I grow things with “prickly” right in the name? Some people subscribe to the slippery slope school of thought — if we let you do this, what’s to stop the next guy from marching an army of pink plastic flamingoes across his yard? And what then? Cars up on blocks?

This will sound more cynical than I mean it to but, it’s been my personal experience that most people a) lack imagination and b) lack follow-through. The whimsical, artsy guy who thinks up marching an army of pink flamingoes across his lawn will probably never do so, and most people would never even think of it, let alone contemplate doing it. Given all the freedom in the world, most people who live in Scarborough will continue to mow their rectangular, grassy front lawns. (No disrespect intended — please substitute “Scarborough” with the name of any other metropolitan suburb in North America.)

For me, this, like the thistles and finches, boils down to intent. It’s the difference between being too frightened to serve a mandatory military term and calling yourself a pacifist: one is borne of deep conviction, the other of self-serving convenience.

If Ms. Leepel were an avid green-thumb who made an informed choice to grow herself the wildest of English country gardens, I would be all for it. But “can’t be bothered” doesn’t qualify as an esthetic choice.

(Anyway, I never saw much use in front lawns, being more of a fan of Tuscan-style interior courtyards – why waste so much lawn between the house and the road when almost no one ever uses it? But that’s a digression for another day …)