25 JulSlaughter Is Messy Business

My neighbors’ houses have meticulously landscaped yards. I’m not like them. I’ve learned that you don’t have to mow your lawn very often if you don’t water it. It’s a very green way to go. It saves resources. It also saves time. I have more important things to do with my waning time on Earth than to take care of a yard.

In spite of this attitude I took pity on my neighbors and went out to pull weeds this morning. I have a circular drive out front. When I built it I laid down sheets of weed block and covered it with gravel. The weeds have grown nicely there anyway. As much as I don’t need a meticulously landscaped yard, the defiant weeds in the circular drive bothered me. They’ve been getting taller and taller over the past month and it looks like they’re getting ready to seed.

I went out while the sun was still behind the eastern mountains and decided on an attack plan. The weeds were pretty well rooted, and there were a lot of them, so I knew better than to use the bend-over-and-pull method. The sit-on-the-ground-and-pull method was no good either since the weeds covered so much area. Over by the pickup I spotted a defunct office chair that is waiting to go to the dump. It was perfect. I was able to sit in it and swivel in all directions like a ball turret gunner on the bottom of a B-17.

I sat in that chair and went to work. I swiveled and pulled and pulled and swiveled. Then I drug my chair to a new position and did it again. Strength was on my side, but the weeds had the benefits of numbers. They came at me like ants on a praying mantis. I met them with a grim determination that kept me pulling even as the sun crested the mountains and started steaming me with its hot, yellow rays.

The weeds growled and gritted their teeth as my hands wrapped around them at the base where I gathered up all the branching limbs. They screamed as I pulled, but I never showed mercy. The sounds of their agony died away as the roots let go and I tossed them into a mountainous pile. They attacked with pricklies, but that only made me angrier. Thick, sticky fluid—white and viscous—oozed from broken stems and stained my hands. Slaughter is messy business.

I sat panting and dazed with it was finally over. I struggled with my hands to stop the crushing motions. I felt unstoppable emotions well up inside me and I screamed “WAR IS HELL” up at the sky. A young father passing by on his bike put himself between me and his little son on training wheels. It was the right thing to do.

I went inside where my wife talked me down with watermelon therapy. I sent out the cleanup crew. She is good at whitewashing history. Future generations will never know what happened on this day.