Chapter One: Lawn headaches and first steps to freedom and food Chapter Two: Outwitted by a groundhog, writers David Grayson and John Burroughs, joys of growing my own food Chapter Three: Moving, divorce, no garden, boyhood garden, why I garden, house hunting, the moonscape yard, creating a new garden, using boulders for retaining walls, reducing lawn, Thoreau, seaweed: the good, the bad, and the ugly. Chapter Four: A garden can heal the heart, blueberry plants, coffee grounds, acidic soil, stone walls, Native Americans, colonists, writer David Grayson, future plans Chapter Five: Assisting earthworms, David Grayson's farm, enriching the soil, strawberries, deer, turkeys, soil pH, John Muir, fisher, fencing, early seeds, seed spacing, transplanting strawberry runners, commercially grown foods, deterring deer from the garden, netting, chipmunks, overcrowding in the garden, goal of growing 40% of food for four months Chapter Six: Peaches, dogwoods, lilacs, butterfly bush, frost, juniper, south-facing slope, an insolent rabbit saga Chapter Seven: Rachel Carson, DDT, water supplies, red-winged blackbirds, quests for the perfect lawn, ideas to reduce applications of chemicals, No Mow May, children, changing perspectives, lawnatics Chapter Eight: Research on the health benefits of gardening, the "Glucose Revolution," freshness &and vitamins, boiling vs roasting, eating in season, wisdom of the ages Chapter Nine: Meadows and mowing, sticks, understory trees and bushes, weeding: chore or challenge, different weed guards Chapter Ten: Simple life of the Nearings, composting, Native Americans, fish in the garden, raccoons, corn, leaf thieves, leaf blowers, construction of compost bin, synthetic fertilizers, red tide Chapter Eleven: Unwanted caterpillars, insecticides, insect covers, natural B.T., Kale and cruciferous cole crops, tomatoes, hornworm, vine borer, squash bugs, pollinators, beneficial insects, non-toxic sprays, big-eyed bugs, herbs, flowers, crop rotation, Roundup, bees, aphids, the dirty dozen and clean fifteen, forever chemicals Chapter Twelve: History of lawns, alternatives to a lawn, lawn care companies, boyhood, joys of gardening, public space, research and studies on gardening's calming effects, Thoreau, children, gardens and mental health Chapter Thirteen: Summary of the steps we can all take, seeds of change, community gardens, wildlife corridors, cattle feed, Blue Zones, legumes, helping form new perspectives Epilogue Return of the groundhog About the Author Support the Mission.