Battling An Obstinate Adversary

We delayed the attack as long as possible, knowing that the battle would not be easy. The face-off should have occurred in the spring, but it was late August before we finally approached Seymour, white flag in hand, for one last try at diplomacy.

There was obvious distrust on both sides. Seymour was not ready to forget about our past transgressions, and we could not forget how Seymour had taken every opportunity to get at us when we were close by.

Hours of pruning have exposed some of Seymour’s living branches, but the rose bush is still largely made up of dead cane, requiring many more hours of battle.

Some thought the winter had done in the rose bush we had named Seymour, for there was no sign of life when the snow melted and the motor home-sized plant was exposed; but we expected more from Seymour and knew that, even in death, dealing with the giant-thorned branches would be as dangerous as approaching a living thorn bush.

Indeed, in mowing the lawn around the rose bush, Seymour still extended the thorny cane in order to snag us if we got close enough, and, once snagged, there would be blood, for Seymour would free the thorn so it would stay with us and perhaps dig deeper if we brushed against something.

This time, though, we saw proof that Seymour was not dead, for new green shoots with infant thorns waved in the slight breeze on that hot afternoon.

There were only a few green shoots visible, but we were confident that Seymour lived, and that pruning away the dead cane would enhance the rose bush’s chance of reestablishing itself.

With that thought in mind, we approached Seymour and made a proposition: If allowed to bring out the bush cutters and trim away the dead branches, we would spare the living vines. To reassure Seymour that we were serious, we offered to do the trimming while shirtless, exposing our flesh. If we reneged on our agreement, Seymour would be free to pierce our skin with the deadly thorns.

When approaching the bush, we did make one concession to the reality of the situation: Leather work gloves protected the hands wielding the bush cutter.

It started out well, but we soon learned why nations coming together after long disputes often fall back into warfare. First, in cutting off a branch that extended over our head, we were suddenly snagged by a couple of thorns. Then, when cutting a particularly long cane, we discovered that there was new growth at the end. Each side had broken the truce.

We tried not to let those accidental failures affect the peace process, but soon there were two new wounds on the arm, and another dead branch that proved to have a living offshoot.

Meanwhile, the hours were passing. In order to trim without damaging the live branches, not to mention trying to untangle the intertwined growth, the work had to proceed at a slow pace. We could begin to understand what it is like for a surgeon who has to trim away dead tissue without harming the healthy tissue around it.

There were moments when we both lost it. Seymour would occasionally lash out with several thorny branches, grabbing our arm or our chest and not letting go until we carefully picked off the thorns, one by one. In retaliation, we would speed up the trimming, ignoring the possibility that we were cutting off living branches in the process.

But cooler heads would prevail and we would strike the compromise pose once again, carefully working our way around two sides of the gigantic bush.

Finally, the heat and the exertion forced us to fall back, and a call from the house on another matter provided an excuse to quit for the day

While it was apparent to our eye — and obvious when looking at the pile of thorns we carried away — that we had trimmed away a lot of the dead branches, Seymour still appeared mostly dead; and, while there were a lot more of the green shoots visible, many more were still hidden amongst the brown and gray branches, the weeds that we had exposed, and the tree that was growing through the center of the rose bush.

That means that the battle — or the cease-fire, depending upon how one looks at it — will have to continue, and it will go on for a lot longer than it has taken so far. Seymour, who grew from a small rose bush to a giant in a very short time, remains a large and obstinate adversary — and one that, with other projects and concerns, sees to it that we don’t manage to get to all that we wish to accomplish.

 

August 25, 2015