Weed Whacko

Does anyone else have to mow their patio? How about the sidewalk? Any mowing going on there?

I have the world's largest privately held collection of chemical-resistant, nuclear-strength, fast-growing, rampantly aggressive weeds in the little slice of heaven I call my yard.

Forget for a moment that I had actual trees growing in my gutters last year. Scott, in a final act of kindness before defecting, climbed onto the roof and cleared them all. I will sell the house before I do any such thing myself.

My patio is merely stone squares all placed in an orderly fashion to form a flat surface. And evidently a fertile breeding ground for all manner of weeds and trees which grow in nice neat rows from between the cracks. They greet me each morning, defiantly waving to me, daring me to try to get rid of them.

And the cracks between the sidewalk and along the curbs? Rampant space-age bio-dome farms of indestructible weeds that grow up to my thigh.

And my lovely neighbors with the big fence? A few years ago they got the bright idea to plant Morning Glory. Presumably to hide the fact that they'd erected an uncommonly ugly fence to surround their little fortress. And whatever nuclear waste was dumped in my yard back in the day has given the Morning Glory super human strength and magic powers.

I know, I know. Morning Glory only live for a year. Not in this case. The seeds that have been dropped all over my yard and shrubs have started new and more determined growth for each of the last eight years, and the predatory, choking vines have taken over all of the mature plantings in my yard, killing many of them (and in an ironic twist of Fate, killing off most of the dreaded Deadly Night Shade that had been the crowd favorite before) and blanketing every surface with twisting, spiraling, clinging vines that cheerfully bloom as they squeeze the life from everything they touch.

So now, every time I mow the lawn, I also have to rescue the holly trees, and the Shamrock hollies, and the peonies, and everything else, from certain death by raking high up into their limbs and pulling down as much vine as I can, yanking it to a point where I can reach it, and then using all of my arm strength and body weight, tug-o-warring with it until it let's go of its prey. I want to scream. I also want to set fire to the yard of the neighbor who planted it to adorn their otherwise ugly fence.

So I have made peace with the weed whacker and have done my neighbors a solid a few times this year by whacking the s*** out of all the unwanted guests in my yard. I have put on the goggles and long pants to protect my child-sized shins from flying shrapnel, and have attacked the little bastards. I have hated every minute of it, but it is darkly satisfying to see them flying to bits.

But they keep coming back. Thankfully, so does my sanity.