White Houses with Dead Lawns

You know a song is good when it rings in your head like a mantra.

When I was younger, I moved across the country from Los Angeles to a somewhat rural suburban part of the American south. It wasn’t my choice, but as I was like 14, I really had no say in the matter.

It was not easy for me by any means. This was also right during 2020—surely no major events could have impacted this move making it even harder to assimilate!

Regardless, I found my way of coping with change through Adrianne Lenker’s music. When I’d ride the bus to school and pass the many empty fields with a single house and barn sitting in the middle, I’d loop half return. 

Standing in the yard, dressed like a kid

The house is white and the lawn is dead

The lawn is dead, the lawn is dead

It felt like she was singing from my deep consciousness. Everywhere I looked would be white houses with dead lawns. I’d feel something so sickeningly bitter whenever I saw a child out front.

“You’ll never know what it’s like to not live in this dreadful place.” I’d say to myself. It was so spiteful. And looking back, yes, I hear myself. City girl moves to the south and gets punched in the face with reality. I get it. But I was also like 14 and grieving. Perhaps projecting my grief onto these kids standing in front of white houses with dead lawns.

Because if the tables were turned I’d probably be just as culture shocked. If I was born and raised in the south, specifically the somewhat rural somewhat suburban area, I’d be fucking pissed off being surrounded by bustling cars and constant noise all the time in Los Angeles. Truly. I would be so annoying about it.

“You’ll never know what it’s like to not live in this dreadful place.”

—————————————

Anyway, those lyrics were my mantra from ages 14-17 really. Every time I saw a white house with a dead lawn, I’d subconsciously take note. When it was wintertime and there’d be a light dusting of snow on the ground, earlier lyrics of the same song would ring in my head:

Minneapolis soft white snow

35 bridge, hometown

Half return, half return

And despite my hometown never EVER getting snow, I couldn’t help but think of it at that moment. Similarly, when I’d pass a rusted swing set (which was fairly common when you live in a place that has actual seasons), I’d have these lyrics resonate:

Half return, half return

Rusty swing set, plastic slide

Push me up and down, take me for a ride

Extra points if they’re in the yard of a white house with a dead lawn.

But now I don’t live there anymore. I’m older now. I have my own apartment in California. I don’t feel that horrible, ugly bitterness I used to. But that doesn’t change that some lyrics resonate with me and loop in my head like a mantra.

It’s no longer as consistent as it was; I’ve no deep seeded anger towards anything that manifests itself as white houses with dead lawns. I don’t encounter any recurring metaphor-like objects that glare at me as I pass them. I see white houses, sure, but they’re more often than not townhomes. None of which have yards. That’s that California vibe, baby.

I do feel that anger, still. I think something in me was torn by that violent, bitter, nasty feeling that manifested when I’d pass by homes in the south. I should pivot here to tell you that I didn’t always hate everything about the south. Before I moved there, I was more just uninformed. After I moved there, I learned hate ran deep. Very deep. Confederate flags everywhere. Getting called dyke at 9am on a tuesday. I still wonder what came of the little boys who dared each other to come up to me and the one other out lesbian at my highschool to ask us “Do you guys touch each other?” before I’d even had a sip of my vanilla latte. 

So when the hate in me started to fester in the form of white houses with dead lawns, I did nothing to stop it. Maybe I indulged more than I should have. Maybe the call was coming from inside the house the whole time. 

I lived in a white house with a dead lawn. 

I don’t really know why my white house with a dead lawn wasn’t as much of a trigger. Perhaps because it wasn’t really a white house with a dead lawn, as we had no lawn. I can’t really describe it, but there was no lawn. Only tree. Just tree and driveway. No lawn, I swear.

And the grass we did have was behind the house, sloping down a steep, steep hill. It wasn’t dead, for the most part anyway. Majority of the year it was fine. Only wintertime was it browning from the sheer cold. Maybe I justified it to myself that I wasn’t living like the people in the other white houses with dead lawns. Partially because I never claimed that house as my own.

I graduated early in 2023 and took the first opportunity I could to escape that dreadful place. I really fucking hated it there. I found myself in Japan, then back in Los Angeles. I lived with a relative, sometimes slept over at my childhood friends' houses for a sense of normalcy. 

There was no more normalcy. They had all graduated too by then. And just like that I’d missed everything. Summer visits didn’t make up for missing everything between them.

In the weirdest way possible, I think back now when I’m riding the city bus to university. There’s parallels between the two places, sitting in the middle of a school bus in the middle of buttfuck nowhere to sitting in the middle of a city bus in a place I’ve only dreamed of before living here. 

There’s not much else in common. The city does not look like the south. For that I’m grateful. But I am missing something.

I’m missing my mantra.

I think the reason that half return resonated so strongly with me when I was 14 was because I had a place I wanted to return to: my hometown. Or, better put, homecity.

But now I’m on my own and my hometown has no place for me. 

Gah, it’s so stupid!! I know!! I don’t miss the white houses with dead lawns—or the south at all, for that matter. But at some point the white houses with dead lawns started to comfort me. I knew I’d see them. I’d count them. I’d pity them and move on with my life and do it again. Then I’d dream of returning home.

But now I’m missing that feeling. Of the constant around me. This city is too polished; I wouldn’t have any dead lawns to critique if I tried. There’s a part of me that’s terrified of becoming the white house with a dead lawn, in a way. I don’t want to just be a moment in people's lives they use as a marker of when they’ll move on. 

I don’t have a set conclusion here, sorry. I wanted to share this weird little thing I did—count the white houses with dead lawns (take a shot every time I’ve said that phrase!)—and it turned into something way bigger, but it felt nice to write out anyway.

Thank you for reading this. Or skimming through. I appreciate that too.

If you have your own white house with a dead lawn story, do tell. I think it’d help me find the direction I should end this with. Maybe a conclusion to the story is within reach.

Ok, love you all. Goodbye.

P.S. here’s the full lyrics to half return, for your reference:

Shadow, shadow, what a show

Every other step, there's a cross-eyed crow

Half return, half return

Minneapolis soft white snow

35 bridge, hometown

Half return, half return

Standing in the yard, dressed like a kid

The house is white and the lawn is dead

The lawn is dead, the lawn is dead

Illinois toll road, Indiana plain

Roll the windows down, shoot at the change

Half return, half return

Honey in your mouth when you gave me my name

Tears in your eyes when you pull it like a chain

Half return, half return

Standing in the yard, dressed like a kid

The house is white and the lawn is dead

The lawn is dead, the lawn is dead

Half return, half return

Rusty swing set, plastic slide

Push me up and down, take me for a ride

Standing in the yard, dressed like a kid

The house is white and the lawn is dead

The lawn is dead, the lawn is dead