In Which I Show Blatant Disregard For Nature

Remember the plant?

We decided it was too weird to include in our sale of the house, so I went back after it on Wednesday, as though it had personally wronged me somehow.

Vines, by their very nature, tangle.

This one, due to (I believe) some dark infernal force seemed not to tangle so much as braid itself into our valid and intentional plants. It grew upwards through both the crepe myrtles and the fig to form an enormous dark green canopy over the corner of our yard. Also, the nearby corners of the yards of three neighbors whose names we keep meaning to bother to learn.

Gas-powered hedge trimmers? Oh, no.

Electric? Too "Sharper Image" for me.

Solar? What do I look like, a hippie?

So what type of clippers did I have? I'm glad you asked, tired literary device.

Manual clippers. Just a raging demonic vine and me, wrestling in the yard like ancient Greeks with nothing between us but some semi-sharp metal things on a pivot joint.

I can tell you this is exactly how I like it, but that would be a total lie.

Anyway, I got it. Somewhere around sixty pounds of rogue vine got yanked out of our trees and I'm the one who did the yanking.

Now, it looks like the devil shrub was growing up out of at least eight separate places in the ground in the back corner. I was able to count them once I'd ripped away enough of the top to allow some light to filter through.

I cut them all off near the ground and separated the leafless trunk parts from the twisty. leafy braided bits to be burned in separate piles with the ashes mixed with cat hair and scattered towards the south like we did in the old country.

However, I have every belief that the plant will be back. This time, it will be pissed, too.

So, I'm leaving town on Friday. Early. I think the vine will leave Shana and Gwynyth alone, because as I sang my song of destruction I made sure the plant knew who was responsible. Either way, it is an added incentive for them to make a quick sale of the house and follow me a time zone to the right.

Whoever buys our house can deal with the revenge of the evil plant. And the stuff I left in the closet upstairs. And the doorknob that doesn't turn in the proper direction. Maybe they will be left-handed and that last one won't bother them. Actually, it still might. But maybe they will have an extra thumb or something because I think that might make opening that door bearable.

I will hope some mutant falls in love with the house and the demon vine and the sinister door knob and the "tomato juice" stain on the carpet which makes the cats skittish.

Yes, lets all channel our positive energy towards hopeful mutated would-be home buyers hooking up with our real estate agent.

And then let's all try to eat one of these without immediately dying. Or just look at it without having one's heart slow as though it were moving cold lard around the body.  

I have to tell you, though. With Passover coming up, I'd probably try to get one of those into my system (sans bacon) before my diet becomes all matzo and peanut butter for eight days.

Traditional . . . Not digestible.