I Got Pruned

 

I Got Pruned

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Any person raised on the Montana Plains knows how precious is every sprout, blade or leaf of green. Precious. We baby each new evidence of life, coddle it, rejoice when it survives the season.

Living here in central Mexico with year-round green, flowers, fruits, one learns to do differently.

I had to discover how to prune all manner of precious greenery before they morphed into Audrey, the blood-sucking terror from “Little Shop of Horrors” and took over my whole garden world.

It ain’t easy, Babe. But I learned, slowly. In the beginning I cringed with each chop of the secateurs. I could be heard to mutter, “This hurts me more than it hurts you.” Or, “You will thank me for this someday.” Sound familiar, anyone?

Eventually pruning becomes second nature. The plumbago, beautiful in blue, was growing out of bounds. That is a big job, one for Leo, our gardener. Me, I grabbed my tool and snipped off great strips of basil, marjoram, and oregano from my bucket garden. Then I pruned seed heads from some flowers. Small jobs, easily done. Since I have fresh herbs year-round, the debris went into the garden trash.

That done, I walked over to Kathy’s to see her progress with making a mosaic of chips of broken traditional clay tiles around the base of her wood-fired pizza oven.

Now I’ll tell you the story of how I got pruned and my downfall.

After my visit, before I went home, I stood outside Kath’s brick wall with wrought iron topper, talking with Kathy and her sister across the way, framed in her kitchen window.

Chebella, Bonnie’s dog from the campground next door, came around the corner and trotted up toward the bend in the road, where my dog, Lola, was sniffing all the wondrous dog stories.

Oh, no, you don’t, this from Lola. You go back to your own territory. And Lola went on the chase, loudly. Chebella took one dog-instant to read the situation, turned tail and ran her forty-pound body full bore between the wall and me, slamming my knee “ooof” on from the side, pushing it a direction knees are not meant to bend.

I saw it coming and grabbed the iron above the wall, hung on, and body-slammed into the wall but stayed upright-ish. Kathy ran and grabbed an ice-pack and Crin hustled over with a chair. I sat. I iced. Meanwhile, Leo, hearing the commotion, came to investigate. He went off to scout out my old frame walker I’d put in storage for whomever needs it.

With the walker, I figured I’d get myself home to bed, continue with ice and in a few hours I’d be fine.

Ha. One step forward disabused me of that notion. “Chair.” I screamed. “Ice.” I sat, I iced. “Leo, please get me to the Hospital Paris for an X-Ray.” It warn’t easy, my friends.

But a couple hours later I returned having been doctored, rayed, shot with pain killer, given a splinted brace and anti-inflammatory medicine plus orders to do nothing for a couple weeks.

You know how we are. That first day I stayed gratefully in bed, thinking about my pruning activities of earlier. My plants down here often sigh with gratitude for not having to hold up the heavy load of leaf, flower, seed and fruit. It’s a relief to them to be pruned. They grow better.

The second day, like a plant, I could look forward to new growth, as I shuttled between bed and chair. Meanwhile friends and neighbors keep me fed and watered.

The third day I had figured I’d be well. You know. Up and at ‘em. Raring to go. Ja, ja, ja, ja. (That is laughter in Espanol; think disparaging laughter.)

Days later I’m wondering if it might take two weeks or more like the doc said. That’s me shown.

I feel discouraged. I feel grateful no bones were broken. I’m very thankful for my friends and neighbors.

I feel pruned. And I want to tell you, it hurt me more than it hurt you!

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

May 5, 2022

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