A Brutal Chop

I gave the patch of grass, weeds and wildflowers a brutal chop yesterday and I feel terrible about it. I feel bad not only for the death and maiming of the plants but also for the disruption and death of the countless insects that had taken up residence in what was truly something of a wilderness after all of the rain we have had this season. I had to do it because I need to rent out the house and as beautiful as the wild growth was to me, I did not think I could sell this aesthetic to a prospective tenant. The conflictual relationship between ecology (the logos of the oikos) and economy (the nomos of the oikos) has never been clearer. Indeed, some nomos. When I was midway through my murder and mayhem, a mocking bird set off a terrific alarm, flying and squawking out the news about my shameful behavior, flying and flashing his or her black and white wings as if in semaphore.

That same day, or maybe it was the day before, I heard a radio program on a project that introduces children to the slaughter and butchering of animals. The idea is to make them aware of how animals come to become our food. I wish I could remember the precise term that the anthropologist used to describe the state of ignorance in the matter under which we live because the process occurs far away and out of sight, and has been the case for decades.

Most people do not have the same feelings toward plants. In fact, the thought ran through my mind several times, that if I were doing to kittens what I was doing to dandelions, well . . . of course I couldn't do it. Even when I decimated an earthworm or a caterpillar, I felt a stronger twinge of regret than when I sliced down a bunch of grass. It occurred to me that the process might have been gentler and less objectionable had I been using a scythe instead of a gas powered weed whacker, but I am not sure why. I suppose the aesthetics would be different but then what does that matter? Does the mouse feel less pain when it is sliced in two by a horse drawn plow as opposed to a tractor? What say you 'wee sleekit cow'rin tim'rous beastie' ? Right. I thought so.

I suppose there would be more time for aversion, or at least a greater opportunity for regret and reconciliation. So while the actual material fact of the act would be the same, perhaps it does matter how it is done, in the grand accounting of it all.

Wee sleekit cow'rin tim'rous plantie.

Sorry Rabbie.

There is something not to like about plants

These words may seem shocking to you, but I have no trouble saying them, because I think they are true. I suppose it is really not the trees themselves, but their placement, that sometimes displeases me. The event that precipitated this comment occurred about a week ago. Under and around the freeway overpass that is just a few blocks from my home, Caltrans, the California Department of Transportation, cut down dozens of trees and cleared out acres of brush and ground cover, plants in other words, that had been growing there for decades. After a day or two of brutal work at the hands of crews armed with chainsaws, tractors and weed eaters, what was once a dark and foreboding forest is now a wide open space with clean lines and bright sunlight. I have always found it strange that we build beautiful things, and yes I find freeway overpasses to be beautiful, and then clutter up their architecture with foliage that just does not belong there. Trees are not meant to be decoration for our cities. They have the right to live as they form naturally, organizing themselves into communities with multiple species clustering together. What we do all too often is to line them up like soldiers along streets, perverting their true nature. It is a point that Peter Wohlleben makes well in his recent book. It is not good for the trees, shrubs and flowers and it is not good for our cities, streets and buildings. I am sorry that plants had to die, but maybe their sacrifice is a signal that a new form of urbanism, one that does not abuse plants, is on the way.