Friday, March 1, 2013

Chainsaw, pruning, compromise, HOPE

So, I would be really worried right now about all the federal budget cuts and the economy re-tanking, if not for the forward thinking of my fellow Washingtonians.  CNN has an article today... The day that was never supposed to happen http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/03/01/forced-spending-cuts-begin-today/?hpt=hp_t1 .  It should be a scary article, but its not.    No one in Seattle is talking about it.  Cuz we gave maryjane a license.   How did I come to this conclusion?  Well Jimmy and I live  next to a walking trail and when we do yard work, total strangers chat us up.  The general consensus of the total strangers?  "Everythingss gonna be be ok for  'us' (meaning WA residents) since we legalised pot".  That's a quote from a little old lady bird watcher.  We folks in the far upper left corner of the contiguos  United States ..... One of the most overlooked and ignored states in the union, just gave everyone else the bird and said ' We're gonna fix this ourselves!  We are gonna give ourselves a whole new industry!  It will be local. The money will stay here.  In  3 to 5 years  the state coffers will be adequate to the needs of the citizenry and we will have a whole new crop of nouveaux riche buying cars and tipping well in restauraunts.  We,  as a state, gave ourselves reality based hope.

That's my comment on current events. I felt the need to comment since I havent ranted about current events in a few months.  I wouldnt want anyone to think that I'm a back woods recluse who doesnt care about what's going on the world. 

Closer to home.... Jimmy and DD's squeeze   ran rampant with a chainsaw yesterday,  pruning  everything they could get too.  Jimmy and I have been involved in an ongoing domestic discussion  since last August over the cherry tree that sits above our terraced garden.  We put the garden in before all the trees bloomed and leaved for the summer.  By August of 2012  the vegetable garden was in full shade most of the day.  I wanted it gone (the tree not the garden).  It wasnt producing any fruit  that was edible.  Jimmy  pitched a fit and pleaded for its life.  I stood strong in my resolve.  Then Jimmy finally ( it only took him six months) told the truth.  There is a huge rose bush that has wrapped itself around the outside of one of the big limbs and  drips  pretty little primroses from about 8 feet up... all the way to the ground.  I will admit its pretty stunning in the late summer.  Jimmy told me that when he comes around the bend in the road and sees the  huge pink explosion, his heart swells and he  sighs with relief because he knows he is home.  Now , we could have have saved ourselves months of fighting over this issue if he had just told me WHY he didnt want the tree  cut down, instead of giving me psuedo environmental science  BS arguments that I could blow holes in.  Armed with  the truth, I offered a compromise.  Prune the bejeebers out of it.  Cut everything that creates a canopy over the beds and leave  the roadside  symbiotic relationship trunk and limbs in tact. That's what they did.  I'm happy. Jimmy's happy.  See, that wasnt so hard!  They also pruned the apple tree  by the back window. I have high hopes for that particular tree.   The plum tree in the back was not so easily dealt with.  This thing is huge!  They took off one limb that was dragging the ground and then got intimidated by the enormity of the job.  They walked away and left it for another day. 
My project for this spring is digging up all the blackberries and weeds from an area in the back of the house  that is the size of most peoples yards.   I  cut all the strangling vines  a couple of weeks ago and I need to go out there witha shovel and dig out the roots but, I am already seeing the treasures that old Mrs Murphy left behind.  I've uncovered dozens of  bulb type flowers... daffodils , tulips, iris and such like.  I've found at least three struggling rose bushes.  The biggest surprise was the  completely overgrown rockery that I had no idea was there.
I'm really beginning to feel like we may be able to do this.  Last summer when we took  our numb hands and swollen knees in the house and cracked a bottle of wine in defeat we werent sure this moment would ever come.  Now we are rested, almost healed and ready to go again.  But the appropriately named Kracken rum that The Good Typist gave me for Chrisoween is sitting on the kitchen counter in full veiw..... Just in case!

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