The Evil Alexi - Tearing it up on a Saturday

My foot is healing nicely, but it's been a bit of a drama, but not really. I guess I would say, it's different and uncomfortable and a little scary.

 Surgery on Monday, garden clean up on Tuesday, bringing indoors the chives to keep them from the tiller. Friday was the only day I needed to leave the flat.

I was supposed to be at church between 9:30a and 9:45a. I had such a hard time getting out of bed. I waited until the last minute to get out of bed. It was snowing! It snowed in a big, winter wonderland kind of way all morning. I ran errands afterward and then just wanted to go to bed. When I got home, I realized how wet my injured foot was. I was not supposed to get it wet and the sheet of instructions I got from the hospital said I should call with any questions and I should have my bandage changed any time it was wet or dirty. I called the doctor. She told me to go to Urgent Care to have my foot looked at. The bandages were changed.

Saturday I was up, went back to bed, and really got up around 3p. The snow was completely gone. I took a peak out the window and saw the tiller had been through the garden. I had spent so much time in bed that I was feeling antsy, so I got dressed and planned to for a ride.

I went out the back door so I could stroll by the garden and I was sick. All of the straw I'd gathered on one end of the garden to cover the rhubarb and keep them safe from the tiller. I laid rolls of chicken wire across the top and wrapped chicken wire around the whole thing to keep it from blowing around. On Saturday, it was all torn apart. The chicken wire was thrown around the yard. The stakes that were holding it in place were everywhere. The straw was kicked through and scattered all over the yard. The tiller had gotten into the area I wanted to protect. The rhubarb was complete gone. I burst into tears. 

I'd done all of that clean up work on Tuesday, the day after surgery to get it cleaned up and safe. I'd worked so hard on a day I wasn't supposed to do anything at all. It was all undone.

I was sure Katya, who had been asking for a rhubarb plant, had taken them. I thought Alexi might have torn everything up. I went to Alexi's apartment, not there. I went back down to the garden to look at the mess again. I found the rhubarb plants. They were trampled flat and all of the leaves were broken off, but they were still there. 

I decided to wait for Alexi and Valentina to come home. I thought they might be at church. I waited in the lobby. There was chaos going on in the lobby. Then more chaos. And I was so hungry. And there was more chaos and I couldn't handle any more. 

I'd finally calmed down and I realized that taking time to scream at Alexi as soon as he got home wasn't going to undo any of the mess. There was no urgency. So I left in search of Chinese food and took a drive around for a few hours.

I woke up around 3a and couldn't get back to sleep. I went to early mass and finally fell asleep around Noon. It was an on-again, off-again sleepy day.

Monday morning I woke up, but I was so comfortable, I stayed in bed and managed to sleep a few extra hours. I thought I heard knocking on my door. Emma, the cat, ran into my bedroom to hide in the closet. Yep, someone was knocking.

It was Alexi. He'd come to tell me I was not going to get a garden this year because I didn't clean it up like I was supposed to. He said there were mice in my garden, in the straw. I asked if he saw them, he said he did. He thinks his English is great, but since he doesn't use verbs, it's not always clear what he wants, but he was yelling. Eventually I figured out that instead of saying Mouse! Zoom! He was accusing me of trying to keep a zoo in my garden. He wanted the straw out. I told him I'd be out immediately. Then he said I'd owed him $4 since Saturday for the garden. I had it handy and gave it to him.

I stumbled around, put on my coveralls. I pulled my wheeled garbage can full of stakes and tools from my walk-in closet and went down to the garden. It tipped over on some tree roots. As I approached the garden, two Chinese women (Lang and Gao) were talking about me ("Jennifer" not being something often heard in Chinese) in an unflattering way. Everything was tore to bits. It was a bad morning. 

I got the first bin-full of straw to the dumpster. I didn't want to throw it away, but I was trying to keep some peace and keep Alexi out of my garden. Lang, who shares the north boundary of my plot was hanging her fence. She uses pieces of wire fence she's scavenged over the years. She won't speak English, but she understands a bit. My Chinese is extremely limited, but I got her to understand that instead of me putting up my 5' fence, and she, her's, we could both use mine and save the work. I said we could use my stakes too. Last year I had fence and stakes to surround the entire plot. It makes sense to share. Gao joined her and they got started.

My stakes, cloches, and extra fence were on the ground and I was working on the second bin. Alexi came out with Valentina.

Words ensued. Alexi admitted to doing it. I lost my temper and started yelling and throwing fistfulls of straw at him. I showed him the rhubarb he trampled and the stakes he pulled out. I told him the whole point of the exercise was to keep things protected ("No! No protect with grass!") and I told him it was for the tiller on Saturday. Not only had he torn up everything and made a mess and trampled my rhubarb, he let the tiller in to the area I was trying to protect. I went on a rage and yelled out my foot and my surgery and the pain I was in. I was fired up and I just kept yelling. Alexi forgot about my surgery. He forgot that he said he would help me work on it. He forgot that when I finished on Tuesday, that he told me everything was OK for the time being. Then he told me to shut up - I was being too loud and everyone could hear.

He walked away and after about 5 minutes, I started crying. Sobbing and bawling while I was trying to clean up. I was so tired, so discouraged, so frustrated, and so worried about my foot. I just stood there and cried.

Some Chinese women came to ask me about my garden, saw me crying, and I told them what Alexi had done. They asked if the whole plot was mine. When I said no, the younger woman who spoke English really well, translated. This woman, Wang, was going to have the other half.

With help from the woman who translated, I told her that I had plenty of fence and stakes for the whole full plot and we could share it. I told her I had tools and she is welcome to use them. It was her first year gardening, and the expense of getting started can be tough

Gao jumped in. I don't know exactly what she was saying, but she seemed to be claiming some of my things. She flashed some cash at Wang. 

Last year, I bought a roll of chicken wire fence. It was much more than I needed. I offered the extra to Gao. She said she'd buy it from me, but not until this year. I thing she was afraid that somehow I was giving the fence to Wang - I don't know. Bickering.

Wang and the young woman with her said they would take care of everything and I should go rest. One hour, and they'd have everything cleaned up. Then they offered to hang fence. I was still crying. The kindness put me back to sobbing.

I hadn't planned to hang fence, just clean up straw, so I didn't have all of my tools at the garden. I went to my flat for the tools, came back down using a crutch and was chased away. I came in to eat lunch and fell asleep. FOR THREE HOURS!

I hurried down to the garden. All of the straw was cleaned up and gone. All of my stakes and cloches were stacked in my plot. All of the fence was hung and reinforced. Gao had kept all of my tools and supplies in the garbage bin in her plot for safe keeping. They'd all worked so hard. I started crying again.

It was 7 days since my foot surgery.

Not good. Not bad, but not good.

It's Thursday now. Monday I had surgery to remove a cyst from my right foot.
As I was locking my apartment door to meet my ride to the hospital in the lobby, Alexi came with a piece of paper that had a note about cleaning up my garden plot and paying for it. I'm only getting 1/2 a plot instead of the full plot I had last year (long story), and Alexi was insistant that I get my garden cleaned by the end of the day Tuesday. Alexi's English isn't so good. He prepares what he wants to say, but he isnere for hoursut th't prepared to listen and answer questions.
I pointed to my walking cast/boot and said doctor, hospital and made a cutting motion and pointed at my foot. He got it right away. He said he would help me.
Surgery went fine. I felt great after surgery, popped right out of sedation, and it's only now that I'm getting uncomfortable. I'm not taking the maximum amount of pain medication and I've been walking around without my crutches.

Tuesday, I was worried about the garden. I raked the whole plot, filled in some divots and tried to gather every thing I wanted to keep to one side so the rototiller can till most of my plot. The half that my new garden neighbor is getting is all cleaned up. I was hours. Then I went to the grocery store, since I was out of  a lot of things. When I got home I was so wiped out. It's not tired, sleepy, or sore, it's zero energy. It's hard to explain.

Wednesday afternoon, I decided to try going without my walking boot. I'd been wearing it 24/7 until that point. I don't know if it helped or hurt. We were supposed to get a big snow storm, so I planned to stay in. I can't get the bandages on my foot wet and I cannot change them on my own. I decided I wouldn't be able to go out for days because of the snow.

The snow missed us, but parts of the state within a 1 hour drive got as much as 15 inches. When I woke up this morning, the ground didn't even look damp.

I asked Alexi about the tiller. He said it would be Friday or Saturday. Since the weather settled, I decided to go back to the garden. Chives, onions, and herbs that I left in the ground last year wintered well and they were sprouting in the path of the tiller. This afternoon, I geared up (coveralls, rubber boot, multiple plastic bags around my cast, garden gloves, etc) and went to dig them up. It was much colder than I planned. Monday, it was 85F. This afternoon it was right around freezing and windy.

Digging up the goodies went faster than I planned and there were way more plants then I realized before. They all had really great root systems. I did all of this without my crutches because I knew my hands would be full of tools.

When I came in, my calf was aching. I think it's got something to do with the way I walk when I'm in the boot. Other parts of my foot and ankle are aching now too.

I planted all of the seedlings I dug up in a punch bowl and watered well. I hope they will keep until I'm more healed. I think I might have to take at least a week off of the garden. I still have to water the seedlings in my apartment, but at times like these, when I'm hurting and waiting for my pills to kick in, I really don't want to think about tending them at all. Later. When I'm feeling better.

We're done with snow that will stick around very long. We may still get snow for the next few weeks, but it won't harm plants and it won't freeze the soil. I'm not worried.

Now to prop myself up, lounge and cuddle with my cat. Napping is in order for sure.