Actual Dirt Is the Only Vaccination

 

Trump has no philosophy or ideology. His only governing principle is to hurt people he hates. And that’s a lot of people.

--Gary Pearce

Annabelle Hydrangeas. That is not
our garden

For example, the whole state of Maine, because Maine's governor -- a woman, and how dare she! -- said she wouldn't bow to Trump about barring transgender women from sports. She famously also said, and in public, “I have spent the better part of my career listening to loud men talk tough to disguise their weakness.” Trump promised to cut all Federal spending to Maine.

Trump has taken Russia off the leash, and is letting Putin swallow Ukraine, because Jethro can't get over how Zelenskyy refused to manufacture dirt on Joe Biden. A whole nation gets destroyed.

Trump hates Anthony Fauci, Mike Pompeo, and John Bolton, who were all important cogs in Trump 1.0, but insufficiently slavish, apparently, and Jethro removed their security details. Pompeo and Bolton have been targeted for assassination by Iran, and Anthony Fauci has more death-threats against him than Tesla.

I could come up with examples of Trump's mean pettiness for hours, but contemplating all that wreckage is exactly what has driven me into my current obsession with gardening. I've been throwing myself into raking out beds, composting weeds and debris, and mulching every blessed inch of the place with well-aged horse manure, and during that labor with dirt and plants I forget Trump 2.0 and its absolute madness and danger.

We have extensive gardens of perennials, shrubs, and trees -- a collector's garden with many rare natives but also plenty of exotics, particularly the Asians (because many of those specimen species are as close to outer space that I'm likely to come). I have two people who help me, not counting Pam, who will eventually have worked her way on her knees through every inch of every bed, lifting and dividing, and discouraging where discouragement is required, and uncovering the over-taken for a new shot at light -- the "editing" that every well-kept garden requires.

I'm an editor too, though old age has made knee-work more difficult. When stooping, I'm reminded that stoop-labor was the curse on Adam (and talk about mean old gods who love to hurt people!). Gardening is order; also chaos; reassuring in its repetition; but combustible with mutation. It's invigorating; also frustrating, rambunctious, and capricious. With invasives and aggressive native weeds, it can seem like Ukraine, losing territory to relentless plunder.

But it's a cold rainy day today, so I'm inside psychoanalyzing myself instead of dividing Annabelle Hydrangeas.