After, On Cedar Avenue

Fifteen months ago I blipped this house where I was working. I had carved away the worst of the overgrowth at the long-neglected property and cleared the patch at left, where an impressive garden now bursts out. When I found the place, the overgrown bush (turned tree) beside the porch was 3x this size and covered that square with its leaning boughs.

In the "before" picture, there was a thick, dead pine tree on the near side of the steps. I stripped it of vines but it stood there until much later. Now that space too is looking good and bringing up food.

It pleases me to see how the recovered spaces are doing, because nobody ever asked me to cut back this vegetation or, for that matter, much more of it behind the house. I was contracted to make repairs on the inside only, with discretionary powers in the agreement. I saw it as a chance for the right thing to happen in a year-long time window, before a new group occupied this land-trusted house.

People who don't understand huge, dead, overgrown plants; those who argue for the rights of milk weeds, should not be expected to think about a place like this until after a guy like me has had his way with it; after my blades are cool and clean and stowed away.