by Nicholas Stitt

Created on: September 01, 2008   Last Updated: September 21, 2008

Due to format restrictions, I have indicated Italic type with tags around the text.

Defeating the Death Fern

The backyard monster had several names, but its last was Death Fern. The Death Fern began like any lawn trespasser; some wild seed wove into the trench soil bordering our home and set itself up a camp. At spring's passing, the Death Fern stood knee high, and by mid July it could compete with my shoulders. But by the end of August, our evil fern had grown embarrassingly out of control, easily ten feet tall, with a stalk as thick as a sunflower to support its jungle of branches

Any seasoned gardener would have handled this in early spring, transplanting the problem with one scoop of a hand spade. But I'm no seasoned gardener. I suffer from acute Botanophobia.

Self diagnosed, and by my current calculations, wholly inexplicable. Most fears are rooted in childhood trauma, but I have no such luxury; an adult man with a fear of plants is just wimpy. Granted, I'm no outdoorsman, preferring the dirty sterility of a grungy, overpopulated city block. But by man, a species I know and trust, and by their garbage, an offense I contribute to. Buildings, synthesized, woven with steel and concrete and glass give me warmth while carpets and furniture, made of material unrecognizably distant from their plant origin, make me comfortable.

But I am still afraid of plants. Even routine supermarket trips will unsettle my stomach if I think too hard about the produce I'm picking through. These all had to come from an orchard somewhere, or worse, grown wild in some Godforsaken jungle amongst thick grassblades and vines and stinging bees and sucking worms and leaves big enough to choke on and mummify your body in. Some desolate place where one ankle snapped in a mud hole would seal your fatality-with no EMT's to dial for help, no men to hear your cries of pain, the jungle would start its dirtiest work; pulling, wrapping, feeding you into itself, bringing your body back to nature.

I'm getting better. I know this because I have a backyard. I didn't really want one; a three bedroom flat in a gated community, one where whole crews of men are paid to keep flora off the concrete would have done swell. But when time came for house shopping, two people very close to me just insisted on a grassy plot, even a small one. The first person was my dog, craving a territory to call his own, running free of city leash law, and to chase a Frisbee thrown further than down the apartment hallway.

The second

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