First, thanks for your continued support and interest as I have struggled with the Garden Police over my front yard.
As I reported a couple of weeks ago, my lawyer and I met with the GP and their lawyer, who asked me in the interest of neighborhood harmony to make a big cut. He said if I did he would go to the complaining neighbors and say look, he made a big cut, he has rights, too.
The next day I left for what turned out to be a wonderful trip deep into Mexico, deeper, perhaps, than I've ever gone. I expect to be writing about it and putting up some pictures on my web page, so please plan on visiting in a couple of weeks to check it out.
Days into the trip, on a bus from Mexico City to Tlaxiaco, Oaxaca, I began to think about the garden. There is a strip in the mountains of central Mexico that is just fantastic. It's too lush to be desert, but it's got the most fantastic cacti: Huge seguaro types, the great candelabras, barrels, blue palms, in rugged mountain canyons and up the steep slopes. It must have been the exceptional beauty of that particular strip that brought me back to my little problems. Because I think in a subconscious way my garden reflects what I find interesting, beautiful or important in the world. And I began to feel affronted, and to be angry. I seethed with self-righteous indignation. I thought of doing crazy things. I talked to my traveling companion about it. He couldn't remember what the front yard looked like, but it sounded to him like I was blowing the whole thing out of proportion. He's a guy who likes to go to the mat about US military aid to Columbia and such, but he said he couldn't really see taking on the establishment over a few plants in the front yard.
Then pretty soon we were lugging our stuff through an exotic market and catching a ride in back of a pickup, two hours dirt road over the mountain to San Juan de Mixtepec, and I guess I forgot about the GP for awhile.
We'd come for a wedding. It started at 3 the next morning and went on for a couple of days. Sometime during the middle of it I began to brood again. That's when I decided to hell with it...life is too short. I give up. Whatever it takes to get them to leave me alone, I'll do it.
LATER, IN MEXICO CITY, my daughter Elissa came up with a good idea: Brujeria--witchcraft. She said there are shops where you can get spells, potions and amulets for all sorts of purposes. I figured it's too late for the front, but maybe I could get some extra protection for the back. The GP lawyer again affirmed that they were only interested in the front...what I do in the back is my business. But at this point I don't really trust them to respect my privacy at all. So we set off to find a bruja.
We headed south from the Templo Mayor through the old section, down streets closed to vehicular traffic and jammed with street vendors selling elotes (roasted ears of corn), tacos, locks, stockings, audio tapes, baby clothes--all sorts of useful and useless objects. Past Los Antiguos Reyes, the old downtown pulqueria. Past stores with big mounds of dried chile peppers of every variety, others full of rope, or luffas, or bicycles, or school supplies. Through the crowded evening streets to Delegacion Venustiano Carranza and El Mercado Merced/Sonora. It was like Grand Central Market on Third Street or some of those street-to-street malls in LA's Chinatown, but much bigger, tighter, more crowded. Shoes, clothes, more meaningless plastic, fresh vegetables and numerous stalls specializing in herbal healing and/or brujeria. They displayed amulets and icons of an impressive variety; the traditional Mexican calavera, the Virgin and saints, but also stout jolly Buddhas, elephant-headed Ganeshas, and many-armed Shivas. Rabbits' feet. Herbs. Packets of mixed herbs for a variety of uses: removing envy, turning back a spell, improving business.
We stopped at one shop and waited for the proprietor to finish with his current customer. Then Elissa laid out our problem to him, stressing that we didn't want to hurt anyone, just to be left alone. He recommended a heavy hanging creation made from two crossed daggers with a plaster figure
of two angel heads, a bag of herbs hanging down, a horseshoe wrapped in
multicolored embroidery thread, glass beads, feathers, a postage stamp.
It looked powerful. We said we'd take it. He sprayed it with a magic potion. Then he took another spray can, pumped a little into the lid, and handed it to me: "Use like perfume. For love."
I wasn't born yesterday. I know that love can get you into even more trouble than gardening. I declined. But I did pick up a sprinkle-laced candle wrapped in a photocopied US dollar bill, designed to improve cash flow. As soon as I get this garden police business cleared up, I'm going to light it.
Of course I don't believe this superstitious stuff. It's a lark. Nonetheless, as I walked off with my charm I felt that a great weight had been lifted, a weight of resentment and frustration that had been crushing my heart. And once I got home and hung it in a special place in the back yard, I felt I had regained a certain amount of control over my life. And I swear this is true: Before I even got around to taking the plastic shrink-wrap off the candle, someone had slipped a $20 bill under it!
SO THIS WEEK IS cut cut cut and trim trim trim, and try to get beyond a point where they can complain It's enjoyable work, and the garden will still be cool when I'm done. I wish I could say that my work is totally free from resentment and rancor. It's not. I can't help wonder at each bamboo I cut, "Is there really a compelling public interest in cutting this plant, that I should be made to do it?"
Jim (my lawyer) called the other night. The GP attorney, Kenneth B. Dapeer, wanted to make sure we were still on for next Monday. I told Jim pretty much what I've just told you. He said he thought I was doing the right thing, and added that he may have a few amulets of his own to keep disapproving neighbors out of my life.
Anyway, the GP will be here Monday at 2. Jim said he'll come around noon. Several of you said you might come by....come at noon...I'll fix some lunch. Peter
