THE LAWNMOWER TREATY

Synopsis

The strip of grass between the Dolan and Ferro driveways is four inches wide and has been mowed by both households, on alternating Saturdays, for six years, without a word ever being said about it. In April a word is said. In May, Harlan Voss moves in at number nine, thirty-one years in the foreign service, retired eleven weeks and bored down to the bone, and offers to help. He proposes a framework. He suggests minutes be kept. By the time the first draft circulates, the cul-de-sac has two sides, a working document, and something it never had before, which is a record.

Who this is about

Harlan Voss spent thirty-one years in the foreign service negotiating things that did not hold, retired to Cutter's Bend, and misses it more than he will admit to his wife.

What goes wrong

His new cul-de-sac is four inches into a border war over a strip of grass between two driveways, and Harlan offers, out of pure habit, to mediate.

What's at stake

Mediation gives both sides a table, a record and a reason to escalate. Within a month the street has factions, and Harlan is the only one who understands why.

Why it keeps going

Every episode adds a clause, and every clause creates two new grievances, and Harlan cannot stop because stopping would mean he was never any good at this.

Takeaway

A dispute nobody names can go on quietly for years; the day it is written down it becomes a war.

Shelves

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Story, in the creator's words

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