Meanwhile, back at the ranch

The truth is, I said to a friend of mine, as we walked around my less-than-acreage, I used to be able to guide people away from the crap parts and over to some nice little spots. But now it all looks like crap, and don’t tell me otherwise.

I won’t, he said.

So what am I going to do about it? The current gardeners will do anything for me, anything except bend, stretch or reach. They’re gardeners in name only; they don’t even own gardening gloves. Yes, that should have been the tip off. That and their perfectly white and unblemished, uncalloused hands. My hands don’t look so bad either, given the amount I have to do in the yard, just maybe like I give them a good scrubbing with broken glass now and again, if I wash them at all.

My three horticulturalists prefer to get all their mileage out of the weedwacker, although that’s something else in name only. It’s a bushwacker, a lawnwacker, a treewacker, but it’s leaving the weeds very much to their own devices.

I asked The Fat One, the head of this landscape architecture firm, if he didn’t have a lawn mower. “What,” he said, looking rather puzzled. “You want me to mow the grass?” If you wouldn’t mind, I told him. He half shook his head to show the world he thought this very ill-advised, but anything to make me happy.

In addition to the weedwacker, they have a great fondness for the leaf blower. Not to blow the leaves out of the yard, just deeper into it. For awhile I thought they were actually collecting the leaves and putting them in the compost pile, as I didn’t see great piles hiding behind trees. But then, after the last rain when my French drain overflowed, I found their secret hiding place.

So I talked to The Fat One again, and asked that they blow leaves out of the beds, and most specifically not into the drain. “What,” he said, “Not in but out?” And this time he looked rather interested, as though I might actually have an idea. Perhaps not a particularly good idea, but one that hadn’t occurred to them before.

The only good thing is, with past gardeners, if I left my own tools lying around the yard they would surely disappear – rakes, clippers, shovels. Even a bag of fertilizer once. But with the current crop, if my stuff doesn’t blow or whack, then it simply can’t get mixed up with their stuff. They’d just as soon lift up my rake as build a second story on my house.

So next month, I’m going to do nothing, nothing but get this place back into shape again. I’m going to fire these gardeners, even though every set seems so much worse than whatever came before. So now I’m almost fascinated to consider what could possibly be next.

Maybe I’ll cut to the chase and hire the very worst one of all: me.

(Two new pieces over at Patch and Animal Magnetism.