Schizophrenic Gardening

One of the hardest things for me to leave behind (besides family and friends, obviously) is my garden. Every house that Dear Hubby and I have owned, excluding this house, has been new construction. That means landscaping from scratch. I get to decide what the lay out will be, what plants and trees I want in my yard. It's all very fun...and as Hubby would point out...also time consuming and expensive!

I know I should never do this...but I will go back to my old houses and see what the new owners have done with the yard. I know what will happen when I get there and look...it always upsets me..."what happened to my Hosta collection?" ...."Where did my Peonies go?"...."Why did they mow down my cutting garden?". Even worse, I'll talk to my old neighbors (who know how much time, energy, and love I put into my gardens)..."They just dug up your Hybiscus and threw it away!!" Oh the pain! Why do I do this to my self? It's like getting on the scale after the holidays...you know it's not going to be good news....it's only gonna depress you...but you just have to know!

So gardening in this house will be a new experience for me and my gardening venture. The house is a couple years old, and we were told by the realtor that the previous owner liked to garden. Even though we looked at the house during the winter months, I could tell that the sellers were my kind of people....she had pictures of her landscaping laid out for us to see. And even more exciting was the fact that the guy across the street owns his own little perennial business (who, as rumor has it, gives free gardening advice). I could see it now (cue the dream sequence music)...me digging in the garden...and deciding on a whim, "I think I'll put some Coreopsis here"...standing up and brushing the sweet, soft perennial blend off my hands and marching across the street...grabbing my new potted baby...waving to "Perennial Pete" *names have been changed to protect the innocent*...and saying "Just put it on my account Pete"...because of course I'll have an account.

Ahhh, but that dream was shattered on our first day here. Remember when I talked about how friendly everyone was here except for the crazy guy across the street? Well, that was my "Perennial Pete". (Don't worry, I'm sure the chances of him ever reading my blog are about as good as him coming over and apologizing....sigh).

Let me tell you about our experience with "Perennial Pete" so far.
Day One: Move in day....It is pouring rain when the moving semi pulls up. Our street is very narrow. Hubby and the moving guys do their best to position the truck on our side of the street with in our postage stamp sized lot lines..."Perennial Pete" calls the Sheriff on us....for blocking the streets.
Day One: One hour later..."Perennial Pete" comes out and yells at Hubby...because obviously he didn't get the results he wanted by calling the police....
Day One: Two hours later..."Perennial Pete" comes out and yells at Mac and her girlfriend for turning around in his driveway...
Day One: Minutes later..."Perennial Pete" comes out and yells at Bud for parking on "his side" of the street...
Day Two: The next door neighbor comes over telling us their "Perennial Pete" story...when they came to look at the lot to build their house..."Perennial Pete" tells them about all the lots being in a flood zone...about how he's planning "to raise himself some chickens" and build a "giant chicken coop" on the edge of his property....
Day Three: The stories from other neighbors just keep coming...apparently they all witnessed and cringed when they saw the Sheriff and our moving van...cuz they knew it was coming...."Perennial Pete" pulled a fast one last year on the city and had out street rezoned and made it so there would be no parking on either side of the street....had signs posted and tickets handed out and everything....that took months of city meetings and arguing to get that mess all straightened out.
Heard enough? Yes I could go on and on....

The point of all this? Yesterday the weather was beautiful. I'd had enough unpacking of boxes. I decided to get my hands dirty and just pull a couple of weeds. Well, one thing lead to another, and when I finished with the weeds I decided I didn't like the Creeping Myrtle that was around one of the trees out front. I think Creeping Myrtle is nasty stuff. It is a bully of a plant...takes over everything....choking the life out of other plants. As I stood there debating on yanking these plants out of the ground, I thought about how I feel when I see the changes the new owners have made to my gardens. Will the previous owners drive by and cry out "Why, oh why, did she do that to the poor Myrtle?" Even more gardening schizophrenic thoughts....I wondered if "Perennial Pete" would call the Sheriff on me....

I decided to yank away...and proudly, I only looked over my shoulder across the street a few dozen times.