My Outdoor Rug!

Down back behind the house, there is a canebrake. This started as a single stalk of bamboo that I had gotten from my Uncle Alfred years and years ago. It stayed small for the longest time only reaching about five feet in height and maybe had ten stalks at the most. Then..Hurricane Katrina hit and totally obliterated my small patch of bamboo. It saddened me that I had lost this start of the cane and wondered if I would ever get another patch to grow. After a year or so following the hurricane, I noticed a small shoot of bamboo trying to make a new effort. Now..a good six years later this stuff is humongous! It has grown to about thirty feet in height and by my estimate a good hundred or so nice size canes are in the brake. Why it has suddenly taken off with a rapid growth is beyond me but it is nice to see. This brings me to today...

I was out wandering the hill again when I noticed that Ms. Ez had done her usual disappearing act. This was not good! As of late when she is out of sight, she is rolling in something putrid. Yes..I know this is a doggy thing but I just did not feel up to washing her this evening. The best thing to do was find her and find her fast! I headed for the back yard where I knew there was a mass of stinkhorns growing. Just the thing for a nice, smelly dog! There she was but not near the stinkhorns..instead she was trying to sneak up on a rabbit. (Seriously now..try to imagine a big, clumsy, galoot of a dog trying to sneak..this in itself would be worth a story!) As long as she was busy with the bunny, I had no worries about her and the stinkhorns. I ventured down near the canebrake and was impressed by the "strawmat" that lay under it. Not exactly straw but the fine, slender leaves that had fallen matted themselves together in ruglike formation. This matting was nigh on an inch thick and quite sturdy. I pondered the fact of why the bamboo leaves were not used in making indoor/outdoor type rugs. Considering the fact that these were still pliable yet rugged enough for me to walk upon made me think that a rug would be in perfect order! It would be a simple matter for someone with any seamstress talent at all to stitch the fronds together in a mat shape. The thought lingered just long enough for me to realize that I was almost talking myself into another "flight of fancy" undertaking! Ok...so the nice mat of cane leaves looks lovely..and feels divine underfoot..but do I really want to gather, sort, clean, bunch and sew cane leaves? Hmmmm...probably so. Anyway, that will most likely be left for another time. This year, however, I might simply rake and bed them in some area as a freestyle matting..perhaps as a path between the fig trees!

Now...where did that dog head off to this time????? Ezz....Ezzzz...Ezzy? She and the rabbit were no where in sight!