I'm a transplanted Southern belle who lived in Amherst during college where plows were the order of the day and later moved to Boston where plows were the order of the day and so were boyfriends who never, ever would dream of expecting me to shovel, much less express out loud any desire or wish for me to shovel so I thought I was doing a good thing.
But maybe I made a big tadoo out of nothing. So. Let's say ... hypothetically, of course ...
... let's say you were helping out by shoveling a path from the driveway to the back stairs of a house.
You're shovelling along at a fairly good pace when suddenly you hear,
"Oh no! You've dug up the flower bed ... my poor perennials!"
After muttering under my breath, "Why you ungrateful little shit, shovel your own freaking driveway next time" I did feel horrible. What do I know about gardening? What do I know about perennials. WTF are perennials anyway, I wondered.
Besides, wouldn't you TELL someone there was a flower bed given the snow covered EVERYTHING in the yard?
And wouldn't you just bite your tongue, given the person was helping you out and you DIDN'T give a warning about where the flower bed was?Is the garden dead? Having been dug up a bit, is it salvageable or was this just a bit of drama? And why on this green earth would a man have a full scale meltdown like that. (of course, that was nothing compared to what was to come later but I was pretty shocked that day that a grown man was actually exclaiming "My poor perennials!")
My friends weighed in of course, with varying degrees of exasperation:
1. Sorry, don't know anything about gardening, but, no I would have kept my mouth shut - you were doing something nice for crying out loud. I HATE people like that!
2. Drama. Put the dirt back, it'll be fine. sheesh, some people...
3. They're dormant now and don't even know what hit them. So just put them back in the ground and whisper "you'll be OK" to the plants.
4. Well, that'd be the last time I ever did a favor for him! But don't worry. You have to dig pretty deep to kill perennials. They come back year after year and in order to survive in areas where the ground freezes need to develop pretty deep roots. Any damage above the "freeze line" is meaningless and won't kill them. Put the dirt back, roll your eyes at the drama and don't worry.
5. You heartless, heartless woman, you! How dare you shovel snow for someone else!!! But the next time you do, would you mind shoveling it into my yard? I would love to play in some snow. Thank you!Signed, A California dreamer.
6. Pfffffffffft. Tell him he needs to put up some of those yellow flag thingies next time, if it's that freakin' important. Oh, and tell you to have a nice time busting his ass on the ice, too.
7. oh pluh-eeze.
Toss the dirt back on, they'll be fine sweetie. And I second telling him to have a nice time busting his butt out there! And THIS GAL I should have taken out to dinner and sat at her feet because she NAILED the little shit right here: If anyone ever seriously said "my poor perennials" in front of me I think my reaction would be more along the lines of stomach-clutching laughter. That is hilarious! Sorry, even though I spent many of my formative years in Junior Garden Club I know nothing about plants. Could be why I find his horror humorous.
Well, he was a DRAMA QUEEN and I ignored the flags on the field and not only continued seeing him but MOVED IN. *duh* Big, huge, major mistake.
Honestly, the best thing out of the relationship was my relationship with his phenomenal daughter. I coulda skipped all the drama with him and just hung with her.
She was 12 at the time, hated all of his previous bimbo gurlfriends and loved me on sight. She is quite special, I tell you. Uhm, not cos she loves me but because she is unique and smart and irreverent and no nonsense and in-your-face and fearless and loves/hates her dad and doesn't understand him or why he hurts the people who most care for him including both of us but let me tell you, that day of the Snow Shovel Hurt Perennial Drama, she got into the car with me and said, "My dad isn't a very good communicator."
She later told me she knew it wouldn't be long before he created enough problems, issues, drama to push me away. Hey, I can be a bitch, don't let me fool you but he could be a bigger bitch. He was creative in the problems he created, I'll give him that. But she was dead to rights about him.
Absolutely, sadly right.
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