The Kind of Human Wreckage That You Love

title and figure: The Black Parade, My Chemical Romance, 2006

X-Men Vol. 143...he brought it on himself

I'd rather not argue with myself; it's about as pleasant and civilized as a Tarantino film. I worry about whether or not to salvage rotten logs from the woodsy, leafy mulch areas between our neighborhoods and it's an issue that really riles me up against my general dogma, even though I end up doing it anyway. These bullies--Guilt, Doubt, and Treehuggery... no amount of rationalizing or loud singing shuts them out. And, under certain physically compromised conditions these skirmishes toss my brain around like a seal pup at an orca fest. Naturally, I always get my way in the end because I'm determined to have whatever I want, even if my conscience continues to prick and pout. I know once the rotten wood is transformed into Garden Art, both sides will be satisfied, my means justifying the ends, but man-- those demon bullies know just how to twist the shank.

Joshua Tree: Take only photos, leave only footprints

I can hear some of my friends slamming their minds closed as we speak. "Don't you dare take anything from the woods, Sheila Shedd!! Yes, yes, I totally understanding fragile environments. For you who have never crossed the Rockies, the entire West is one unique ecosystem after another and developers and ignorant tourists are true-life basterd-demons. God! The sight of one Juicy Fruit wrapper on a park trail makes me froth with indignation. Like, I could just run screaming for the Park Ranger.

 NEVER take driftwood from the Olympic Peninsula, a pumice pebble from the billions of tons surrounding Mt. St. Helen's. Lift not a single chip of petrified wood from the thousands of acres of Arizona desert, even pine cones, though they grow a meter long, must be left where they fall in San Jacinto, because, friends, these areas are environmentally sensitive, delicately balanced, and finite. They just don't recuperate from humans. And humans can certainly wreak amazing havoc for their size.

see the blue t-shirt way back there? that's not bigfoot. it's a guy dumping his yard waste

But my neighborhood, Subdivision X, is not Mono Lake, ok? Behind the lovely, pesticide coated, mowed-within-an-inch-of-its-life landscaped verge, Subdivision X has tree breaks. These "community spaces" average 50 feet wide and mostly they separate culdesacs. They are used by humans to collect yard waste, dog poop, clay scraped from tennis courts, teenage droppings, utility boxes, and beer bottles. True, some of them have smooth, blacktop paths, not skating surfaces, unfortunately, but great for walks. If you confine your gaze to 10 feet on either side, or look to the tree tops, these are pretty, forested areas, especially in summer, when all the flora blooms up. The true colors of these unfortunate spaces become exposed in winter when they look like a stretch of highway reserved for mandatory community service weekends. They're a tangled mess, and all that indiscriminate dumping forces untimely decay

It's an awkward, filthy, cumbersome job to take rotting logs out of the ground. To begin with, they're so heavy. The stuff underneath is scary, but you MUST face it all, touch it, check it for life, transplant sensitive creatures--even icky ones (well, frankly they're all icky), scrape as much soft mulch as you can free from the dry areas with your fingers, if you're a finger user, maybe you might use a tool or a stick, but still...and if any sizable colony of any life-form, no matter how inferior-seeming is using this one... you have to replant it.

8"Tiger Slug...lives in my backyard; plenty of nice food there, tons of rotting leaves, no empty beer bottles

a baby gecko dragon!! (just kidding, it's a root but
it's still attached so of course I wouldn't take it.

You can't just assimilate every species you come across and plop it into your collective, because then you end up like Kurt Cobain:

                  Underneath the bridge

                  The tarp has sprung a leak

                  And the animals I've trapped 

                  Have all become my pets

Despite this rationale, I'm west coast liberal treehugging indoctrinated and I really struggle with this.

It's not stupid. Plus, it costs every shred of my dignity and peace of mind. 

Bella hunts squirrel and rot

It's 9am, 87 degrees, 60% humidity, the air is whining with mosquitos. I don elbow length gloves, sweats, tall rubber boots; carry a camera, a small shovel and a bent-to-shreds disposable turkey roasting pan. Oh yeah, I have a badly sprained foot. All this self-inflicted misery is bait for those Demons. I bring Bella. She weighs 72% what I do and pulls me merrily along with twice as many legs working and carries only a poop sack. She has eaten. I've not even had a banana yet. 

I park at the school. The teachers are having a pre-year thing; their hair is freshly coiffed, they've been to the beach, they wear sneakers and shorts. I've been unable to shower recently due to severe ennui. I stride past them into the woods as if I am not a freak. I do not make eye contact, because--and this is good general advice--you MUST believe that if you close your eyes and cover your ears, you are completely invisible.

I wedge up the log. Nothing is living under it; it's just a rotting piece of wood. Despite that fact, I lug the nasty, crumbling 25 pound limb to my car, totting all my stuff and being tugged by a leash. I grunt right past the nice, clean ladies who decorate their yards with rainbow metal twirly things, and probably never have to tell themselves to please, shut up already and   just            keep           climbing.

I'm dirty, exhausted, starving, under attack by my conscience, and pissed off at my dog.

i have showered and justified myself, that's why I'm happy

I'm keeping this dead thing.



And, besides, no one here gives a flip. I have to point out every gnome, monster, weathered cliff face, and dancer that IS this rot. If I wrench these creatures free and set them a lovely environment with all the bugs, weeds, birds, and appreciation they can handle, then I am Freeman Lowell.

Bruce Dern in Silent Running, he took off into space with the last of Earth's completely unappreciated trees and 2 pre-R2 drones

Herbert West, Miskatonic University:
founding father of  preservation

Wait...maybe I'm Mr. West! These dead things become reanimated as living garden art. I MUST be allowed to continue! I will give the wood a second chance to contribute to the living world and I alone will defeat rot!

I'm finally clean and home, everything's quiet inside the psycho pit, then Alex says,"You got another piece of wood? Don't you have enough stuff back there?" Dammit. Now, I'm forced to examine my motives, the reality of my space limitations, my responsibility to Nature, and my sanity. Can't I  just go la-dee-da along with my whims and toss back into the woods whatever doesn't work? 

Hitchcock 1960, waste not, want not

I know it's unseemly, but consider taxidermy. My first job after UCI was at an eccentric Laguna Beach art gallery.  For months, we kept a courageously stuffed 6 foot tall peacock in the window. The indignation we fended!!  Come on, people!  OBVIOUSLY it is rude and sinful to kill something and stuff it merely for decor. But that gorgeous bird lived its full life in a beautiful park, bred several times (probably with different hens), was treated like the king he was, and just like you and I and every tree will, he inevitably died. OH MY GOD,WE DISPLAYED HIS LOVELY PURPLE CORPSE.  Ok, maybe a coyote missed a meal, but I think they prefer left-over KFC anyway.

(On the other hand, my classmate had a purse made from her cat's pelt, and she used the exact same logic. That takes too much philosophizing just now, but I'm happy to discuss this topic or any other Norman Bates related stuff.)

Here's something really cool...we lived in Oregon for a summer, and the Fish and Game patrol are obligated to collect every skeleton and feather that falls to keep idiots from poaching animals for their skins. Yep. people do that, apparently.  One of the rangers toured us through a warehouse full of bones, disembodied wings, unhatched eggs, eagle feathers, and the like. He gave me this bobcat skull as a parting gift, and I treasure it.

what difference does it make if the Oregon soil had 2 fewer ounces of calcium that year? stuff disinegrates every day

graciously bowing gnome or
pig's head emerging?

....But not on my watch, baby.

Cthulhu climbs over a rock wall

dancing creature looks gracefully backwards

scary ghost stick

venerable root; the birds love this one

a flame installed and beautiful

What confuses me is that no one I've met seems to care, and it rather offends me, even though I skulk around about it.  Everyone that forces me by convention to speak to them on the trail, retired officers, Florida hippie transplants, pet walkers, teenagers, all think it's unremarkable, and are really hard pressed to see the beauty in the booty. Some even offer to help me carry stuff back to my car.

So, are my neighbors insensitive destroyers and usurpers, or am I just a goofball? Think about it. If they don't struggle with this issue on my level of conscience, even if I'm slightly overboard, what happens if they end up in Yellowstone? My god there's some awesome rot there.