Pure Evil

Garlic Mustard

This has been the bane of my existance this spring. When I moved to crazyacres 5 years ago, I marveled at the spring wildflowers in the woods and in my "lawn" (mowed weeds). I noticed this little flower was here and there, and thought, "Oh, how sweet!".

Now, this monster demon-spawn straight from hell weed has invaded my entire yard, despite my effort to pull them, burn them, weed-wack them, etc, you get the point. If you didn't take time to read the link, these monster demon-spawn straight from hell weeds produce 250,000 seeds a year, per plant. They live for 2 years, they cannot be killed, the demon-spawn seeds lie dormant in the ground for 5 years, the root system changes the chemicals in the ground to prevent other plants from growing there. If you pull the weed when it is flowering and leave it on the ground, it will still mature and go to seed. You can't burn the pulled weeds, as the seeds will float out in the air and spread even further. You have to put the pulled weeds in a closed container and wait for it to compost.

As I have spent day after day after day, year after year, fighting this evil &%$#@*, I keep thinking of virtue and vice. How easy it is for vice to spread and choke out virtue, and how difficult it is to root out vice. How I have to prevent any further spread of the weed, but cannot eradicate it myself. It truly is impossible to rid my property of this weed. IMPOSSIBLE. I need a "messiah", and savior, someone to do a job that is impossible for me.

This led me to contemplate my frustration in attempting to eradicate this weed. This must be what it was like pre-Jesus. The struggle, the work, the knowing that it was impossible to weed out the sin that had entered the world.

So, every day I keep pulling the &%$#* garlic mustard, feeling grateful that the salvation of my soul is not dependent on my labors.