"ARE YOU SURE it's the grass?" some executive deputy assistant associate director's secretary asked me. "Everyone's having allergy trouble these days."

"Well, I don't usually hyperventilate over Gulliver's Travels."

The assistant turned out to be very sympathetic. She promised that the tank commander would notify me before the grounds crews came to cut or spray the grass, or even if the wind changed direction.

I KNOW HARVARD is big on tradition, and there is no more traditional time than Comencement. A nice, lush lawn for the robed seniors to trek across is probably as symbolically important as the butter pats on the Union ceiling. And anyway, the University would turn the grass iridescent yellow if it thought that would mean more alumni and parent donations.

But can't the administration do something about the toxic goo all over the place? Some traditions, after all, have got to end. I'm sure they'll clear off the butter pats when they turn the Union into an office building.

I'm not trying to downplay the importance of good grass. What would a Yard be without it? And green grass means healthy things growing, right? Warm weather, flowers, baseball, the Olympics, graduation.

But these days, the most unmistakable sign of summer is the sticky residue on every bald patch of open land in the greater Harvard area. Sure, the grass looks great now. But a month ago, any part of the Yard not under a building was drenched in blue-green chemicals. Harvard was like a gigantic poster child for the Rio conference.

In the old days, I'll bet the grass grew on its own. The Yardlings were all stately white guys who didn't play ultimate frisbee or football on the lawn. A bunch of Cliffies didn't dig up the middle of the Quad for a bonfire. And hundreds of tourists from Dubuque didn't kick up the sod chasing squirrels with bits of Au Bon Pain corn muffins.

And of course, if there weren't any grass today, you'd all be sinking into the mud right now. But don't worry--even if it's raining, this newly replaced, chemically enhanced Grass Product won't go anywhere. Until about 2092, when it finally decomposes.

THERE IS ONE solution, I have discovered, to Harvard's environmentally unfriendly tradition-saving technique. Just pave over Tercentenary Theatre and put in astroturf.

It might buck our pastoral tradition, but it would be a lot healthier. Besides, astroturf is easier to care for, doesn't involve any mud or pollen and looks great.

Otherwise, I'll look pretty silly at my own Commencement next year. In addition to my sign saying "HIRE ME," I'll be the one with the oxygen mask.

Beth L. Pinsker '93 is editorial chair of The Crimson, She's currently buried under a mass of tissue and drugs somewhere in Pennsylvania.