This Disco Stuff

"Like a kind of beauty and the beast of the senses I suppose?"
Ken revved his lawnmower back to life. Stood a metre to his right and
just over a fence Carol, his neighbour, jumped.
"What is?" she shouted, but no head turn from Ken. Ken now lost in his
lawn cut racket. Again Carol shouted, louder this time.
"Sorry Ken! What is?" there it was, the head turn. Ken shut his mower
down. With his neck twisted looking over his shoulder at Carol, he
frowned.
"What?"
"The beauty and beast of the senses, what is?" Carol dabbed beads of
sweat from her brow with an off white hanky. Not naturally off white
but off white for the thousand other beads of sweat wiped thereon
before. The sun, being as it was on this particular day, had been known
to conjure such beads of sweat from various brows in the past. Ken's
brow was dry. His cardiovascular was in much better shape than Carol's.
Referring to the episode here for instance. Ken's brow, halfway through
mowing the grass of his lawn at dinner time in May, was dry. Carol in
the same conditions, was leaning against a fence. Her brow was wet.
Though what Carol lacked in cardiovascular she made up for in vision,
she will more than likely never need glasses. Ken had being wearing
glasses for as long as he could remember.
"You were saying how you liked the smell of cut grass, how most people
do." Ken stared with green useless eyes over at Carol, waiting for her
to grasp the beauty and the beast thing.
"Yeah, most people do. It was number 1 on the 100 greatest smells. Did
you see that, the 100 greatest smells of all time? It was on TV at the
weekend."
"No I didn't Carol."
"Yeah cut grass, it topped the bill"
"Well I was saying about the noise. Of the lawnmower you know? It's a
shame that it goes hand in hand with the nice smell. Ugly noise,
beautiful smell. Beauty and the beast of the senses." Ken smiled, his
glasses tilted up with the huge lip curl.
"Oh right. That's what you meant?" Carol dabbed more beads from her
brow "I'll let you get on with it then Ken" and with that Carol turned
round and headed up back into her home leaving the door open for fresh
air. Ken whipped the rope start on his mower and like zombie it groaned
back to life. He was half done already, 10 more minutes and his garden
would be clean shaved. Mowing lawns and sending off the cuff e-mails to
friends and family were Ken's favourite pass times. They were not
always his favourite pastimes. Ken was gone forty years old by the time
e-mails were as common as phone calls and he had a paved garden for the
first 27 years of his life. It's this thought that kept Ken the
optimist he was. For 27 years, he thought, he went without having the
satisfaction of mowing a lawn. It was 40 years before he could casually
enjoy typing away nonsense on a whim only to send it to someone he
loved a second later. So, he thought, what other great thing is coming
head on? What's going to hit Ken in another 27 years? It was Ken's
sweet belief that quite simply, there are things to look forward
too.
Ken stood by his kitchen sink, peering out on his freshly cut lawn he
smiled. The sun turning the grass into what the colour green would look
like on steroids. He looked down at his palms. They were dirty. The
lawnmower had been sat in the garden shed all winter, like some turtle
in a box. Autumn and winter elements had seen to it that dirt of a
particularly thorough nature had gathered around the black grip handles
of the mower, with the help of sweat this same dirt had now transferred
directly on to Ken's palms. If the grass in the garden was a steroid
green Ken's palms were a depressed pink. He hit the beak shaped nozzle
on the near by hand wash, the blue pearly stuff gooped in his hands.
For two whole minutes Ken scratched and scraped away at his hands, like
a couple of greased up wrestles frolicking on the canvas. Left verses
right. In the end they both came up spotless.


'I was invited to a Toga party last weekend'
This was the first line of an e-mail Ken was to send to an old friend
he hadn't contacted in over two years. It carried on...
'I'm 51 years of age and someone invites me to a toga party. Only once
before in my life have I had the opportunity to attend such a soiree. I
was 22 and I wasn't interested then. I know it's because I'm body shy.
Maybe next time I'm invited to such I'll be less body shy? How many
toga parties do you think an average person (living in the western
world) will be invited to in their lifetimes? It all depends on the
social circles I guess? The world must hold a lot of toga parties. Is
their ever a night the world goes without a toga party? Just think,
it's plausible there'll be a toga party every single night from now
until the human race is wiped out.'
Ken was abruptly startled at this point of his e-mail. What sounded
like a couple of no good alley cats scrapping in his back yard urged
him to stand up from the computer desk and edge off toward the
direction of the noise.
"Bloody cats" Ken went to pull back the curtain of the little square
window in his back door. There he was, Rolly. Rolly the scrawny tabby
cat from two doors up. Facing him with his back arched high was Smoky,
the black and white cat from two doors down. Ken banged his back door.
Both cats were seconds from a territorial scrap, a bang on the near by
door wasn't going to startle them any. Instead Ken watched for a few
moments. Ringside seats for the big Rolly verses Smoky fight. It'd seem
more impressive if not for the fact Ken saw this same fight every other
night of the week. Sometimes Rolly came up tops but the majority of
fights went to Smoky. Ken believed this particular row of gardens
belonged to Smoky for that reason. Though Ken also believed if Rolly
was willing to challenge this notion no less than 3 times a week then
Rolly deserved his chance. 30 seconds later the fight was over, Smoky
unsurprisingly walked away with the victory, Rolly walked away with a
limp but Ken walked away from nothing. He was transfixed, the cats had
been gone for nearly a minute but still Ken remained by the door
peering out into the garden. He was caught in a gaze that looked
somewhere between disbelief and childlike fear. Ken would never finish
that e-mail he had just begun, for Ken was bewildered by something
outside his backdoor in the dark garden.


"Ken what time is this?"
Carol squinting out into the night pulled her dressing gown tighter for
warmth. Ken stood outside her front door, the streetlight bouncing of
his big stupid glasses.
"Sorry Carol, I've obviously woken you."
"And with a fright no less, who knocks at doors this time of
night?"
"You're frightened? Wait till you see what I just saw!"
Carol's head bowed and with all the concern of a parent or teacher she
knocked Ken a little frown
"You alright Ken?"
Ken grabbed her by the arm, tugging gently
"Come with me."


"God, you have really nice lighting." Carol looked around in
awe at the immaculate placing of lamps and spot bulbs. She loosened the
grip on her night gown, it was warmer in here, or so the lights
suggested. Ken was just closing the front door behind himself.
"What?"
"Your lighting, it's fantastic. All the time we've lived next door to
each other and this is the first time I've been in your house after
dark."
Ken rolled them inadequate eyes of his around the warming glows of his
front room.
"The spot bulbs were there when I moved in. I guess I just got lucky
when I decided to put a lamp over there" Ken pointed his gangly arm out
toward the north western corner of his living room where sat a chipped
ceramic lamp. Carol smiled at the charming little thing.
"Well next time I buy a lamp I'm gona have you come and place it in my
front room." Ken turned away from the warm front room illuminations. He
looked over into his kitchen, lighting there more operating theatre
than cosy public house.
"Carol?"
"Yeah"
"See that small square window in my backdoor?"
"Yeah"
"Go over to it, look out and tell me what you see."
Carol pulled tighter on her night gown.
"I don't think I want to."
Ken pulled his glasses off. With his big green eyes, with them shiny
ridiculous eyes he squinted in the face of Carol.
"Please" He stared a moment longer, his eyes hanging in oval shaped
sockets like ancient marbles, crows feet bursting off at the corners.
He placed his glasses back on. Carol smiled and edged slowly toward the
back door. Ken followed behind her.
Just before pulling the curtains back Carol took a deep breath.
"This is what all them people must feel like before walking into the
smoke on stars in their eyes." Ken stood right next to her staring
point blank at the side of her face.
"You're really that nervous? You don't have to look out there if you
don't want."
Carol turned to faced him, smiled then pulled the curtains back to see
what frightening thing lurked in Ken's dark garden.
Ken still gawped at the side of Carol's head. He looked three times as
anxious as she, waiting for her response to what was out in the yard.
Carol stared out cautiously but with no great look of disbelief or
fear.
"What am I looking for Ken?"
"Look at the floor Carol, the floor."
Carol rolled her eyes downward.
"Ken? What? What am I looking for?"
"Remember dinnertime today Carol?"
With those words Carol instantly smiled, the smile erupted into a
nervous laugh and she jumped back from the door holding her mouth,
laughing still, unsure of what she had just seen. She calmed down,
removed her hands from her mouth, looked up at Ken and said
"Let's go and stand in it."


"It feels exactly like that stuff at discos" said Carol
peering down to her feet. In front of her was Ken looking down at the
floor too.
"It makes me feel uneasy, I don't like it."
"Don't be silly Ken, I think it's alright. C'mon" Carol pulled on Ken's
white shirt as she went to squat for a closer look. On closer
inspection she noticed it was the same as normal grass bar for the
eerie bleached glow and the fact you could run your hand right through
it with out the least bit force. This grass wasn't there, this grass
had been mowed down earlier on in the day. Ken squatted too, he looked
more uneasy down at this level than he did stood up.
"How do you explain this?"
"Well, it's a living thing I suppose. Grass. It lives and grows doesn't
it?" Carol tried to explain all the time running her hand across the
strange phenomenon sticking up out the soil. Ken didn't want to put his
hand anywhere near it, he let them rest on his bent knees
instead.
"Yeah your right Carol, grass grows, grass lives."
"And so it dies too."
Ken stood up immediately ran off the yard and onto the garden
path.
"My god Carol! My garden is haunted by grass I killed!"
Carol stood up slowly, pulled the nightgown tightly around her again.
She walked calmly toward Ken. Placed her hand on his arm, smiled
"It's ok though Ken. I think its ok."
"All the garden's I've mowed, I love to mow gardens. I'm like Adolph
Hitler to the grass community. That's not ok!"
With an endearing smile Carol pulled Ken back onto the lawn. He
followed cautious of the weird glowing stuff round his feet. Carol
placed her hand tightly round Ken's right wrist and eased his hand down
to the grass.
"It's ok, touch it."
With his palm out flat Ken plunged deep into the supernatural weed, all
the way to the soil to the dirt and damp of new short grass
underneath.
"Your right, it's exactly like dry ice" Said Ken smiling nervously to
himself.
"What?"
Ken rolled his eyes up at Carol.
"The stuff at discos."


"You mind if I make myself a cup of tea?"
Ken didn't hear Carol, stood by his open back door. Still peering in
awe at the green messy glow in his garden.
"Ken?" This time he heard and walked back in his house having one last
look before closing the door.
"Sorry Carol what?"
"Don't mind if I help myself to a cup of tea do you?"
"No, no, not at all."
"Would you like one?"
Ken was still scatterbrained from his supernatural encounter in the
garden. He peered deeply at his outstretched palm now covered in
chopped wet grass and muddy soil. He made his way to the kitchen sink,
hit the beak shaped nozzle on the hand wash.
"No, I'm fine thanks Carol."
Carol switched the kettle to boil and took a seat at the kitchen table.
She peered pensively toward the little glass window in Ken's
backdoor.
"You realise what a supernatural can of worms this is?"
Ken busy in a frenzied hand wash turned to face Carol at the
table.
"Can of worms?"
"Grass lives, grass dies, grass haunts."
"Yeah."
"This must mean everything that lives haunts. Grass, people, tress,
maggots even flowerbeds. Every living thing."
Still washing away the dirt in a lathered frenzy Ken turned the tap on
to rinse away the suds.
"Mmm, I guess. Every living thing." Ken turned the tap off, shaking
away the drops on his spindly white fingers he was immediately taken
aback by the sight of two words on the hand wash bottle 'anti' and
'bacterial'.
As the kettle piped up with its audible bubbling frenzy in the
background, Ken froze aghast, staring at the pair of perfectly clean
hands hanging all wet in front of his huge stupid glasses. The kettle
clicked, the water had reached boiling point.
"Are you sure you don't want a cup of tea?"
Ken didn't answer. What worried him was not what was outside haunting
his garden but what was inside haunting his palms.