WRITTEN BY STEVE JOHNSTON ILLUSTRATED BY PAUL SCHMID

Then I would sell all my shovels, spades, hoes, rakes and anything else used in gardening and buy a water cannon so I could sit on the front porch and wash away any speck of dirt that dared to land on my "lawn." Matter of fact, I would have a water cannon mounted in the front yard and another in the back, and they would look like .50-caliber machine guns.

Instead of saying I was going out to weed the garden, I could shout, "Lock and load" and hit the green asphalt with a full blast of water. To make it even more entertaining, I would have contests with my three boys where we would get points for knocking leaves out of the yard. They would get extra points for chasing their mother, the Truly Unpleasant Mrs. Johnston, around the yard with the spray.

Ha! There are guys reading this who are actually thinking to themselves: "Now that sounds like a good idea. No more yard work, and easy to clean." But if they are smart — and I don't think a guy who is dumb enough to suggest paving over the yard to his wife would stay married very long — they will keep their mouths shut and just dream of the green paved yard.

The problem with grass is that it insists on growing. But instead of letting it grow free and wild as nature intended it to do, humans (read that as "men") like to give it a buzz cut on the weekends. I have male friends who spend more time grooming their yards than they do grooming their own heads.

A guy who lives down the block has a head of hair that looks like a patch of morning glories, but his lawn is neatly combed. The grass isn't just cut to half-inch length; it's cut in a careful north-south pattern. He told me the grass grows in that pattern, but I noticed his eyes glazed over when he spoke about his lawn. He is kind of a Stepford husband — a shell of a man who's been replaced by a lawn-mowing, flower-planting robot.

(I must digress. I think the difference between men and women when it comes to growing things is that men look at plants as something to eat, while women see plants as something to look at. If the plant is pretty, and you can eat it, too, then that's swell.

(When the pioneers came west and rolled over the amber waves, I don't think the guys were thinking that this fruited plain would look better if it was mowed in a north-south pattern. But I think the pioneer women were thinking all that was needed to spruce up the country were some roses and maybe climbing vines on the Grand Canyon latticework.

(At some point, a guy figured he could make a living planting flowers instead of food, and that led to backyard flower gardens. And that led to the eye glaze when a guy finds himself talking about lawn care. I'm through digressing now and will return to the story.)

Of the three homes that Mrs. Johnston and I have owned, only one of those had a lawn, and I covered most of it with a deck. But that doesn't mean there isn't a lot of green stuff still in the yards of the other homes we owned. At each place, I tried to plant a little vegetable garden. Maybe some tomatoes and a few potatoes. But in the past few years, the number of plants that grow stuff we can eat has gotten smaller, and the plants with flowers have taken over all the area that isn't covered with cement.

The funny part is that I was at the garden store and saw tomato plants. But each time I started to reach for one, a sharp buzzing went off in the back of my neck. I would look at Mrs. Johnston and she would smile. Then the buzzing would start again.

But when I reached for a tray of flowering plants, the buzzing stopped and it felt like the back of my neck was being massaged. I felt like I had a part in "The Stepford Husbands."