Nature is Mean and Vindictive

We are renting a house at the moment. There is a mini rose bush in the front yard. (It is a mini-rose bush, not a mini rose-bush. That is, it is a rose bush with small, mini roses. The bush itself is not small in the least.) When we moved in, it was so horribly overgrown that it was growing through the fence, slowly bending and breaking the wooden planks. It hung over the driveway, and we couldn't park near the fence because if we did, we would get a face full of thorns when we opened the car door. The wind would blow off the rose petals which would stick to our cars and ruin the paint. It was a mean, thorny, prickly, woody bush which seemed to scream, "Go Away or I will Pierce You!"

This didn't work for me. I am more social and inviting than the bush. I enjoy the occasional visitors to our home. I also like the option of parking in my driveway with the ability to exit my car without being blinded. At first I tried reasoning with the rose bush, but it was very negative and unwilling to compromise. Then I thought, "This is silly. This is our home. That rose bush needs to comply with our standards of living." So, I pruned it back. Way back. I hacked off everything which hung over and through the fence, and I trimmed it down so that it was level with the fence top. Lovely! No thorns in the face, no petals and leaves everywhere, no broken fence, and no scary thorn bush to intimidate people. Everything nice and neat.

Although it had a thorny, scratch fit at the time of it's pruning, I thought the rose bush had learned it's lesson. However, I now know that it was merely biding it's time and plotting it's revenge. Can you believe it had the audacity to grow? And it didn't grow out into a lush and full flowering lawn ornament. It grew up and over the fence ~ again! I know it was doing this just to spite me. So I kept trimming it so that it stayed level with the fence. Unfortunately, the rose bush got cocky and grew very large, very thick, and very thorny branches which I couldn't snip through. I'm quite certain that it spent much of last fall formulating this strategy, which it put into effect quite quickly once the weather became warm.

Today, I realized that it was already as tall as me, and that it had an arsenal of rose buds ready to burst into bloom above the fence line. This rotten bush had prepared a rose petal ambush for my car! So I decided, "This plant needs to be put in it's place." I picked up the secateurs, and went into battle. Now, anyone who thinks I'm going overboard here, has never had to prune a vicious and recalcitrant thorn bush. (Don't believe me? Read about this poor grandmother who had all her toes amputated because a rose thorn stabbed her.) This mean plant drew blood! At one point, I had half a branch hanging from my arm by the thorn embedded in my flesh. My fingers were stabbed and pierced, and I dripped blood on the secateurs as well as on the plant. I had to retreat briefly, and I went to the house where I washed off my blood, and my husband poured hydrogen peroxide over my wounds.

And now, I have to give thanks to my husband, who saw blood pouring out of my fingers, and decided that no uppity plant was going to treat his wife that way. .....Or possibly it's because he felt sorry that I was being speared and gouged during my pruning activities. (Chivalry is alive, my friends!) Firstly, he denied my request for the large cleaver to hack the bush into submission. Instead, he brought out heavy duty pliers (I didn't know we were allowed to use those tools for gardening activities), and he hacked and trimmed until that mini-rose bush became a mini rose-bush.

The plant has definitely been put in place. It is about 2 feet shorter, and a great deal thinner all over. I can say that it is now a proper lawn ornament, petite and groomed. However, I don't for a moment think that it's spirit has been broken. Even though it looks welcoming, I know that it is sitting there gathering energy for a huge growth spurt. It will sit there and heal, and it will quietly plot it's revenge.

Meanwhile, I am going to put Neosporin on my stab wounds, and I will sharpen the secateurs. I'm not fooled, you vicious rose bush. I've got my eye on you.