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Sunday, August 30, 2009

Dr. Livingstone is trapped in my backyard

Holy shit, I came home after 4 months out West and my backyard looked like it had been uprooted from the Amazon. It's not as bad as it was a couple years ago but this time there is more than just grass. It is overrun by weeds of all varieties and that attracts a plethora of various insects. I walked in my backyard to get to the barbeque and a swarm of grasshoppers flew around my legs and it felt like I had just stepped into a fast moving stream of water. And then, after all the grasshoppers had departed, I noticed that there were an abnormal amount of wasps hanging around in the grass. After my run-in with a wasp a couple of months ago I was immediately terrified of being in or around my backyard. Memories of when I was young and feared the outdoors for its vastness, its vacuousness, the way it appeared endless and also for its abundance of natural sunlight (it makes me feel dirty). But now I fear my outdoor living quarters that border my indoor living quarters for extra reasons than those accumulated in my youth. I fear the jungle that has become my backyard. What am I to do? Shall I face the jungle? Lawnmower in tow, am I to do to my yard what big business has been doing to the rain forest for the past decade? How could I be sure that mother nature would not strike me down with a cascade of wasp stings that would immobilize me and then my grisly demise would be realized by the millions of tiny mouths of grasshoppers as they slowly devoured me.
I would need to wear armor but that could lead to dehydration at the hands of the mighty Solar Orb. It is truly one man against the world. But I must persevere. I must tackle the yard with water bottle at the ready, lawnmower revved, long sleeved shirt and long pants wrapped around my body and I must have my rage just below the boiling point. The rage would need to be called upon at a moments notice so that my system could be flooded with adrenaline should a renegade wasp manage to break my defenses.
It will be me.
The sun will burn.
The wind will be still.
Nature will crave blood.
I will be standing in front of the green abyss.
I will reach into the heart of the dense jungle that has enslaved my backyard.
I will grab hold of the dark heart.
I will mourn the lost explorers that have fallen at the hands of the thicket.
I breathe.
I will breathe.
Then with motor and blade I will tear the dense, tangled heart of the jungle out from its core and restore my yard to its former glory as my outdoor living quarters.

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