Horticultural Homicide

Many years ago I hired a friend’s teen son to whipper snipper my lawn and, much to his mortification, he shaved down my burgeoning frangipanis. He’s felt awful about it ever since, and even asked me not to mention it when I gave him a job reference a handful of years later. Last week, in a twilight frenzy of ‘getting in there and getting it done’ MyMan did the same to my newly-planted passionfruits and hardenbergia violaceas, which were tucked up against my townie front fence in anticipation of a spectacular summer growing season. I couldn’t help but laugh and, in memory of that teen friend we keep referring to his red-faced plant massacre as ‘Josephing’. I think MyMan expected me to sulk or roar but you just can’t be angry at someone who is feeling that bad and, after all, he doesn’t know just how many other plants I’ve killed through neglect (as opposed to decapitation) over the years. Then, if you take into account that he was cleaning up my yard at the time after finishing his two jobs and is responsible for the window box watering system that has my thyme and coriander thriving, well…let’s just say he’s still ahead in the plant-killing stakes.