I must've been antsy or anything of the like last week, during the last week of February 2011 actually. The reason I posit such a commentary is that I took it upon myself to prune a wild Riverbank Grape Vine in Lake County, Illinois on Friday Feb 25, 2011.
The backstory is that I used to play the role of Taxi Driver from late July 2010 up until about middle November 2010 when I decided to resign my distinguished post because the vague rules of working with a purposefully vague owner/operator were just irritating the shit out of me. I remember reading somewhere that a cunning person in certain situations can see where rules don't cover certain areas thereby opening a gateway to operating in an underhanded way. Working within the proverbial loophole it might be described as. Take that vague story and apply it to your life or your place of employment and probably in there you'll see some familiar threads.
Returning to that taxi driving bit, yes, I used to drive a taxi primarily in the Waukegan, Gurnee, and Great Lakes areas in northern Illinois. When times are tough, which they still are, you put pride to the side and get a job anywhere, regardless of one's "...station..." as a dear neighbor of mine likes to describe. I am not so much into preserving my station in life, whatever mine might be. My thoughts about 'station' would probably be better suited in a blog that provides a platform for the critique of society and people, generally.
In driving a taxi you get used to certain regions of a state or county, and quite well, because you have to know how to get to places in short order and one can never know when the next call is coming in. But I remember driving down this road just north of Belvidere Road in Waukegan, Illinois. The name of the street is called McAree. McAree apparently picks up right at Belvidere and juts northbound, crossing Washington St. and Grand Avenue, both in Waukegan, Illinois. At the northwest corner of Belvidere and McAree Roads lies a patch of land that is simply grass at the moment. It must be someone's plot of land, but I just don't know. As one walks north on the west side of McAree Road and looks to the west they will notice a wooden privacy fence that has been erected, I believe to prevent individuals from walking into a drainage system on the other side of the now standing wooden fence.
A few times when I was driving southbound in the green minivan taxi toward the terminus of McAree at Belvidere Road, I noticed that a wild grape vine was well-established along the wooden fence. The last time I looked at the vine it was November of 2010. At that time I decided that I would try to either grab a few cuttings from the vine, or go ahead and prune it for practice. I actually ended up doing both on Friday Feb 25, 2011. I took my clippers, parked in the parking lot of the nearby HoBo Hardware store and marched on over to the grape vine.
The vine was in remarkable shape considering that no one had pruned it as yet. Even after my pruning, I am not sure that it is in better shape than when I first reviewed it upon arrival. So I took a shot at it. I pruned the wild grape vine as I desperately need the practice and know-how. I did it because I feel pretty confident that it can benefit from a pruning. It could produce better fruit and not have to send off energy to the ends of the world where its most recent growth has taken it. And, of course, I got my cuttings from it.
One of the decisions I made with the cuttings, once I departed the site after pruning, was to soak them in water. I put them in a 5-gallon bucket filled about halfway with water. From what I have read, it is helpful to aide the cuttings in those first hours after pruning so that the moisture in the cuttings doesn't dry out. Imagine the experience of being completely stricken and rent from a nutrition source, you get the idea.
I have the cuttings still in water, which is problem #1, but I have been at my job in Waukegan away from my materials at my apartment throughout the weekend, still am actually (as I write this update from Bloomington, Indiana). I have a hunch that the cuttings will be fine, given that they can withstand winter temps of -70 degrees fahrenheit. Besides, if they don't do well after sitting in water for 6 days after being lopped, then at least I learn that lesson of why keeping them in water for too long is a bad plan. At the minimum, I know the original vine will be better prepared for the next growing season as a result of my pruning.
As is typical, I have a few photos of the clippings. I meant to take a photo of them in the water bucket, those will have to come on a future posting. For the time being, these blurry iPod photos will have to serve the greater purpose.
I wonder if the vine was the property of Lake County, Illinois. Did I break the law? I am not too concerned. It must've been strange for the clinicians that work at the STD clinic across the street to see some fool like my bad self lopping off cuttings from a wild grape vine. Trust me, a sight like that, in such an area of town, almost assuredly would've been a first for the record books. Put it in the histories!!!!
This feels a bit like a monster getting out of control.
Enjoy!
