Imagine being a working parent who is balancing parenting, long work days and marriage while also dealing with annoying neighbors who get upset when your grass is too long. Would you ignore them, mow your grass more often, or come up with a more creative solution?

In this story, one man is in this situation, and he chose the last option. He seems really excited about the “spite garden” he as planned.

Let’s read all about it.

#spitegarden (Retired Neighbors Make Life Hell for Spouse and I)

My wife and I work opposite shifts with her going in to work early morning and getting home in time for us to hug/kiss and then I’m out the door for my job that takes me past midnight.

I also work rotating weekends and am on call during bad weather.

We have 3 children, the oldest just finished pre-k, so they are not old enough to be on their own.

They take care of their lawn, but not as consistently as their neighbors.

In the rainy season our grass gets pretty long because in order for mowing to get done, both of us have to be home so this usually gets done every other week and that’s *IF* it doesn’t also happen to be storming.

So there are times the grass gets crazy.

Both of our neighbors on either side of us are retired. They have all the time in the world to care for their lawn (but they hire people to do it for them anyway) and they look immaculate.

Our lawn, aside from the length, is free of weeds (bermuda grass tends to choke everything else out) and is overall taken care of.

The neighbors don’t seem to care about their situation.

So our neighbors, because they have nothing better to do, will call the city and report our lawn’s “unsightly length” two or three times a month to try and “motivate us” to keep it cut.

And we’re talking the DAY AFTER I let it go for a week because I happened to be on call that weekend.

Now I have spoken with both of my neighbors about the time constraints that my wife and I have, it’d be one thing if we didn’t have kids or if they were older and my wife and I could go out and mow when we have the time. But this has fallen on deaf ears.

My typical work week is about 50+ hours in busy crunch time which, of course, also occurs in the rainy/mowing season but I assure them that when it’s a clear day and we’re both home, the yard work gets done.

The boomers don’t understand.

This of course falls on deaf boomer ears.

One of them called me lazy and that when THEY were young and married with kids they worked three jobs and made it work and I just don’t take pride in caring for my lawn and blah blah blah.

Another one suggested that I mow during the day while my wife is gone and let the kids run around in the yard while I do so.

That would be a really bad idea.

Yes that sounds totally safe, no way a 5, 3, and 2 year old are in ANY danger while I’m pushing a mower with a spinning blade.

There was one time I was trimming with my kids outside and our 2 year old comes up and tries to stick his hand into the trimmer.

Yeah, no they need to be watched over while one of us is mowing.

He had a lightbulb moment.

So of course I was angry at their response.

But being a mid-western American used to mid-west passive aggression, I got an idea.

I’m just going to convert our back yard and alley into a garden, we’re talking “Hanging Gardens of Babylon” levels of ostentatious. The tallest, bushiest, and vine-iest plants I can find. We’re talking pumpkins, sunflowers, corn, watermelons, berries, lavender. Even getting some stinky plants like onions, garlic, globemaster, or cleome (which benefit the garden because they attract bees and humming birds and repel leaf eating pests.)

The garden is going to be a THICC BOI surpassing ANY length or bushy levels my grass ever got. The added benefit is, while it’s a lot of work to start up. Going out and pulling weeds is something safe I can totally do during the day with the kids running around in the yard.

He has it all thought out.

Our fences on either side are chain link, so all the smelly plants and tall-bois are going right along side the property line of the neighbors.

I’m calling it my “Spite Garden” Everything will have labels like “Curb Appeal Cucumbers” and “These Peppers are Permitted” and my personal favorites: “*jack-off motion* Jalepenos” and the raspberries labels are a picture of someone blowing a raspberry, courtesy of my artistic wife.

There are no city ordinance on gardens other than they cannot be in the front lawn and as long as I keep it maintained and weeded, there is nothing the neighbors can do.

A garden sounds like a great way to deal with the neighbors. They may hate it, but they can’t complain about it!

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this idea.

It does sound amazing!

Is it a “yard” or a “lawn”?

This person has a couple more ideas for revenge on the neighbors.

Here’s another way of handling the situation.

Gardening is definitely better than mowing!

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a tenant who called the landlord after they hadn’t seen or heard their neighbor in days.