The Stolen Dream

I broke a needle on the sewing machine the other day.

Which seemed like a sign that maybe I shouldn't sew for the day.  So Chris asked me to ride with him and the Boy to the bank and to get gas and to Guglhupf for bread.  So away we went.

I should mention that before the needle broke, I noticed one of the maintenance guys picking up litter outside our back window earlier in the morning, but naturally thought nothing of it.

So we stepped outside and I noticed that our little strip of patio was unusually neat.  As in the basil plant that my husband has been carefully tending in it's little terra cotta pot, was conspicuously GONE.  I mentioned it to Chris, "Hey, did you finally get rid of the basil?"  Which invited him to whip around the door and examine the empty patio before howling, "WHAT DID THEY DO WITH MY PLANT?!" 

At that point I started to giggle.  See, Chris' conception of a "plant" and everyone else may leave something to be desired.  My lovely friend Lisa had given us the basil as a cutting from her own plant.  We bought the stuff to use it and then forgot to eat with the basil and just ate the tomatoes and moz on it's own and one thing led to another and the basil sprouted.  Then Chris decided that he needed to PLANT the basil. 

So we stole the terra cotta planter from my sister and planted the basil. 

Now, you should probably know that Chris fancies himself a horticulturist.  But the man can't keep a plant alive to save his life.  He tends to LOVE them to death.  So between the hot-hot summer and the ice cold water that Chris kept using to water the basil, it wasn't looking too good.  In fact, a couple of weeks ago, I made the mistake of suggesting that maybe the basil was DEAD and we should just get rid of it.  Circumstances had reduced it to a yellow-ish stalk sticking up in a cracked planter.  But Chris insisted that basil would come BACK next spring and we should keep it on all winter long.

So keep it, we did.

But as a testament to how pitiful the plant was looking, the maintenance guy must of mistaken it for GARBAGE and hauled it away.

Chris was outraged.  As we were getting in the car he was ranting, "That was going to be our first plant at our house when we buy a house!  They STOLE MY DREAM!"  He continued to rant the rest of the way to the bank, insisting that it really wasn't about the plant, but the DREAM, man!  The DREAM!