Green Side Up

I had a landscaping gig for awhile when I was in my late teens and early twenties. The pay was shit but the work was strangely satisfying and the boss was super cool. His name was Mike and he knew we all partied far too much. He didn’t mind if you showed up for work hungover once in awhile, so long as you were upfront and honest about it. If you came to Mike at the beginning of your shift and said you were hungover he’d keep you away from the heavy machinery for the day, and give you some ridiculously easy task, like rolling out sods of grass. But even this proved too much to bear for one dazed and confused dude. Guy actually rolled out an entire front lawn’s worth of grass sod brown-side up. Poor guy still hasn’t lived it down. It became a running joke. The stuff of legend. A constant refrain. After detailing the day’s work, Mike would invariably conclude with: “Now, remember, guys: Green. Side. Up.” Alas, as my friend Sean Rutledge puts it: “That which doesn’t kill you gives you a new nickname.”