The Quad
The colleges of Oxford University have their quads. Small geometric patches of perfectly maintained grass bisected and surrounded by paved walkways. Thick green blades of genetically exceptional fescue all clipped exactly at the same low height. You may not walk on this grass. Not students, not teachers, not headmasters, and certainly not bright-eyed border collies with bandanas tied around their necks just itching to run down a Frisbee. Only one man may walk on this grass. The college lawn keeper. And he doesn’t so much walk on the grass as just above it. His feet leave no impressions on the turf as he tends the quad. Nor do the wheels of his lawnmower quite make contact with the grass. There is a loophole in the law of gravity that only Oxford lawn keepers seem to know about. They will never reveal their secret for fear that others will learn, and that can only lead to trouble. Soon after there would be students hovering about above the quad playing guitar, or lying on a blanket with their mates enjoying a few minutes of elusive sun, or, heaven forbid, playing a sport. You wouldn’t think that any of this activity carried out just above the grass would do the turf any harm. But the grass would not do well under these conditions. The additional shade cast upon it alone would undoubtedly lead to stress, and stress to brown spots, grubs. Do not pretend to think you know all there is to know here. Consider the detritus normally associated with students: the spit and spilled beer, the crumbs and cigarette butts and fuzzy bits. All of that would work its way downward through the thick verdant mat to the interstices of the soil and poison the delicate roots. Of this the lawn keeper is sure. He would ask you to trust his knowledge and professionalism, his love and respect for the quad – His quad. “Don’t mess with a thousand years of tradition,” he would tell you. “Please do not walk on or just above the grass.”
11:20:43 AM 
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