The Terrible Gardener

Nothing she plants ever grows, but you will always find her out there, in the garden. She dug up the old stuff that used to bloom, ridiculous roses with colors and smells, tulips of every shade, azaleas, impatiens and sage. They had the habit of having been planted by someone else, and so they had to go.

She has made a path through her weeds, a path made of rocks with sharp edges that wobble. No one ever uses this path. Instead, they tiptoe and crush the surrounding ivy.

There are trees in the yard, all sickly and small. They don't really belong in this climate.

She has pots full of plants that had started out nicely - but that was before she bought them. In the nursery they thrived and looked forward to futures of sunlight and water and growth. Once home they began to shrivel and droop. She talks to them lovingly each night.

Here and there are projects abandoned, a vineyard, a shrubbery, a greenhouse. All lie fallow from behind the grey walls and are mercifully hidden from traffic.

The children pass by and peer through the hedges. Doesn't anything ever thrive in that place? Oh yes, things with thorns and with poisonous berries, things the deer hate and gophers don't dig. Dandelions especially call the yard home, and ivy, and tree-choking vines.

She has specialty gloves and specialty tools. She especially loves the wet weather. She can dig and get muddy, and wallow in roots, and generally wreak devastation.