All across the front of my grandmother’s house,
there were flower beds. They hugged the
porch all the way around. These were not
remarkable flower beds – nothing dazzling about them. They held some azaleas and some boxwoods –
not an annual in sight. There were a few
flowers that my grandmother referred to as “volunteers,” and that was about
it. But they also held the one thing
that my grandmother could not abide in a flower bed – nut grass. It was my job to pull that stuff up. Over and over and over again – because it is
all but impossible to get rid of. There
is actually someone called the Dirt Doctor, and here’s what he says about nut
grass - "There is only one guaranteed, foolproof
method to completely kill nut grass. First, dig out every tiny piece of the
plant including the seeds and nutlets. Make sure you sift the soil through a
mesh screen. Dump the collected material on the driveway and burn it. Sweep up
all the ashes and seal in a concrete box. Drive to the coast and dump the
sealed box 20 miles off shore."
My grandmother and I waged war on that awful stuff every year from
spring until it was temporarily stunned by the cold weather. We never, never eradicated it. Every year it returned full force. I don’t think we even hurt its feelings.
Last weekend, I was working in my own flower bed in
my one and only backyard. Guess what I
saw. Nut grass. I poured boiling water on it because someone
told me that would do the trick. It was
not phased. I poured full strength
RoundUp on it – the kind that kills things for a whole year. It did not droop in the least. I dug it up (I hope), put it in a Walmart
plastic bag, tied the top, put it in a gallon size zippered storage bag, put it
in the kitchen garbage can, and ultimately sealed that bag and put it in the
trash can outside. The sanitation
department took it from there. That was
on Monday. There will probably be a nut
grass infestation at the dump pretty soon.
Meanwhile, that pesky nut grass is already peeking through the pine
straw! The battle continues.
Sometimes our “battles” just get to us. I once saw a greeting card that said, “Any
idiot can handle a crisis. It’s this day
to day living that wears us down.” Ain’t
it the truth. There are times when I
feel like all I have done is fight my way through the day. Things just happen. There are emergencies. There are accidents. There are illnesses. There are delays when you are in a
hurry. There are events you cannot
control. The list goes on and on. You are battling the nut grass of life. The only help you need – and sometimes the
only help you will get – comes from God.
He said so Himself – and here it is:
He
gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young
men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their
strength. They will soar on wings like
eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. Isaiah 40:29-31
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