Touching the grass

If you’re on social media for more than five minutes a day, then you have seen the videos of parents and politicians and tour guides and doctors and lawyers and who knows who else using Gen Z slang, sometimes with on-screen translations, which are entirely necessary. Skibidi toilet rizz. It’s giving mildly humorous, no cap. 

*****

Last Saturday was a perfect day, especially if you like autumn-y PSL football weather. It was sunny and blue-skied but also a little overcast, enough that the sunlight was filtered and soft and not glaring but not so much that rain would seem likely. It was cool but not cold. It was breezy but not windy. I wanted to be outside, and not just to walk around the neighborhood or hang out in my backyard. I wanted nature but not camping nature, not hiking up a mountain or trekking through the woods nature. Brookside Gardens was just the thing. It’s practically around the corner from my house, and it’s just lovely - peaceful and beautiful, with just the right combination of real and cultivated nature, rife with walking paths and gazebos and ponds spanned by little foot bridges. Brookside is small, so you can walk through pretty much all of it in an hour or so; but there’s enough to look at that you could spend an afternoon. 

Lots of other people had the same idea, which was nice, actually. I like other people. There was a wedding group gathering for a photo (Brookside is a very popular wedding photo spot) and retired people getting their steps in and families with little children, much like we were not very long ago. I hadn’t been to Brookside in over a year but when my children were little, I was there all the time. My little boys loved to run on the paths. There was a climbing structure with little speakers, and you could push the buttons and hear different bird calls. It might still be there. There was a maze, which is still there but the dirt pathways through the maze are now paved over with stones that contrast with the larger, darker stones that outline the paths, but the contrast isn’t great, and so it just looks like a great big circle now. I liked it better with the dirt paths. The Japanese tea house, accessible by a little boardwalk and a little footbridge, is being repaired now so we couldn’t sit in there but I’m glad they’re maintaining it. 

We spent about an hour and a half at Brookside. We strolled around on the paths and walked through the conservatory buildings. We looked at plants and flowers and trees, and sat on benches near the ponds, and absorbed sunshine and breathed fresh air. It was just the thing. 

*****

I have not adopted very much of the new online jargon for my own use, even though much of it is colorful and delightful and hilarious (though nonsensical), because it would be silly for a 59-year-old woman to run around babbling like a 15-year-old on TikTok. It’s just not my language. 

But I do find myself saying “touch grass” all the time. First, it’s a concise and sharp but not mean way to dismiss someone - “go touch grass” is the 2024 version of “get lost” or “go jump in the lake” (which are also both still very serviceable). But “touch grass” is also solid advice to a person who’s losing their grip, as in “go touch grass.” Go put down your phone and step away from the news. Go outside and take a walk, get some fresh air. Touch some grass and some flowers and some trees. Breathe. The influencers are always out here telling people to touch grass, and having taken that advice, I can tell you that they are not wrong. I spent last Saturday afternoon touching all the grass that Brookside Gardens had to offer, and I felt so much better. 

Two words that say so much - “Touch grass” is a pretty much perfect expression. I’m pretty sure that in 25 years, no one will remember “skibidi toilet,” but “touch grass” has officially entered the lexicon.