Gardenias and weeds...

When I walked up our street with Gracie tonight, I saw our next-door neighbor V walking back to her house with two gardenias in one hand and a huge trash can filled with pulled weeds. While Gracie sniffed the grass at the corner, I stood there and waited for V to get closer to us, then I said to her "Now you know I have to ask you what you've been up to!"

V told me that she had been around the corner at someone's house whose gardenia bushes needed trimming and whose flowerbeds needed some serious weeding. I asked her whose house it was. "I don't know who lives there.... around the corner yonder.... the second house."

Well, I just couldn't resist. I said to V: "You mean to tell me that you're pulling up weeds for a neighbor you don't know when my own flowerbeds are just crying out for attention? I feel so neglected!"

As you may remember... our next-door neighbor V is always in our front flowerbeds, pulling up weeds for us. She does a much better job than I do, and even a better job than our lawn service does. We think V does this manic weeding when she gets frustrated with her two teenaged daughters, and we've told her countless times that she doesn't have to weed any yards other than her own, but she persists. So, being good neighbors, we look the other way when she's out in our front flowerbeds talking to the weeds and apologizing for pulling them up so abruptly.

It was just a funny sight to see this evening.... V holding two gardenias in one hand while she struggled to carry her trash can back to her own driveway. I suggested that she should have taken one of her trash cans with wheels on the bottom, so she wouldn't have to carry the un-wheeled can and risk soiling her Sunday dress. "And why are you holding two gardenias?"-- I asked her.

"Well, while I was trimming that neighbor's bushes, I figured the least they could do for me is let me have two pretty gardenias for my trouble." V held the gardenias up to my face so I could better appreciate their sweet aroma. She suggested that should I want to go around the corner and trim those bushes further, I might want to take some gardenias for myself.

I resisted the urge to remind V that here in Texas, a property owner can legally shoot someone who trespasses on their land. I wonder if that law applies to neighbors in pink Sunday dresses holding two white gardenias?