I'm not complaining, but...

I walked out into the garden this weekend to this. My GOD. The faithful, dutiful attention I've provided Le Jardin Beau all summer and now I have a garden plot so choked with overgrown aggression that I'm stymied. And for anyone who has read "The Ruins" this summer, you all will know exactly the creepy feeling I got when I was crawling on my hands and knees behind the tomato beds and a tendril of something ever so gently caressed the back of my neck. I practically SHIT myself. It says something when I'm sort of afraid to go into my own garden, I think.

On the other hand, I wouldn't be my mother's son if I didn't want my garden to be something for and about nature so I'm proud that I have a garden and flowerbeds attracting hummingbirds (even though the thick, heavy humming of the damn thing almost made me shit myself again because I couldn't see what it was and thought I'd mucked around in a hornet's nest). Here's the close up if you can't find Waldo.

My one and only strategy out of everything I'd planted this year, was to create a lush, flower-filled environment around our little fountain up on the deck. This is where I started and this is where we are today.