It was a day I could finally wrestle some outdoor chores. I knew the weeds had become fat enough and tall enough to qualify as sumo contenders, but I had to try to bring them down. I put on my warrior gear—shorts, tank top, and sunglasses–and took my defensive hands-on-hips stance. “Here weedy weedy, here weedy weedy”, I hissed. I owned those chubby plant misfits and they knew it. Or did they? Booker came trotting out of the garage to act as referee. Since he is always killing my flowers I figured the weeds had paid him off long ago, and I wasn’t expecting a fair fight.
Glancing around the chain link fence, I realized I was not only outnumbered by the weeds, but I was actually in a cage match smack down. The weeds drew first blood when I reached down to pull out what I thought were an easy bunch. Stinging nettle raised welts all over my thumb. Nice one. I came back aggressively and took out a large batch of vines that were choking my iris. Booker tried taking them out of my hands but I managed to toss them over the fence. I KNEW he was on the side of the weeds. I kept going like a wild woman, pulling, ripping, and hacking. Sweat beaded, ran down my back, and collected in unlady like places. Bugs began taking side bets, but I ignored the action. This was personal.
I’m embarrassed to say I had to quite, which means the weeds took the sumo competition. It’s not that I didn’t have fight left in me—because I did—but the doorbell rang and I had to switch gears to accommodate a repairman. When I answered the door I was a mess…sweaty, spackled in soil, a stray leaf plastered to my elbow…but the repairman said nothing and went about his job. I looked at my dirt-caked finger nails and smirked. I made my mark on those weeds too, and it was the best part of my day.
“Where there is love there is life.” ~ Mohandas Gandhi