Cindy went to Cedar Rapids today to see her mom, which left me open to do about anything I pleased. So I lounged around in my pajamas until about 2 p.m., showered and decided to make myself a Bloody Mary.
I'm in the kitchen fixing up a drink and I look out and Jane is in the same clothes she had on from two days ago - green dress, blue sweat pants, mis-matched socks, tennis shoes - but her hair was back to its normal gray from the flourescent blue it was from before.
I saw her over in our yard and she was bending over and pulling up stuff out of the ground. I thought, "Oh, Christ - she's pulling up some of Cindy's plants."
So, I go out there, and sure enough, she's pulled up two or three plants, roots and all, from the ground. I said, "Jane! Just stop it! You're pulling up our plants again!"
She looked at me and said, "Huh?"
I said, "Jane, get out of our yard. You're pulling up plants again."
She said, "Well, where does your yard start?"
I showed her the end of the fence line along the back and she said, "Oh, I don't think that's right."
I blew a gasket. I said, "Jane, get out of our yard and don't come back. I'm tired of you coming over here and ruining our plants!"
She looked rather incoherent and she started walking further into our yard to start pulling at other plants. The plants she thought were weeds were dormant plants. I finally said, "Jane, get the hell out of here."
She said, "Well, you know I don't like weeds." (Could have surprised me considering the amount of weeds in her yard.)
I said, "That's fine, but these aren't weeds and this isn't your yard!"
God, I'm glad Cindy wasn't around or she would have had a shit conniption on the spot.
I went in and called Jane's son who lives about three blocks away and told him to give me a call. He called tonight and I told him that we were tired of Jane coming over and pulling plants that she thinks are weeds. I told him that we were nice about it the first couple of times, then had to get a little more firm each time since then. I told him that I had to get downright nasty with her this afternoon.
I said, "We've spent a lot of money over the past couple three years for plants for our yard and I can't afford to have your mom coming over here and pulling them out because she thinks they're weeds."
He said, "Will, I understand what you're saying. You have every right to be mad at her and I don't blame you. You have a very nice yard and I'm sorry that she's doing that. I'll talk to her and I'll be firm in telling her to stay out of your yard. And if it gets to the point that you need to call the police, please do."
I said, "Look, I'm not going to call the cops. I know she's trying to be helpful, but it's getting to the point that she's ruining our plants. And I can't have that any longer. And the thing that also concerns me is that she seemed incoherent when I'm trying to talk to her about this."
He said, "Will, say no more. We've looked into putting her into a home, but it's a lot easier said than done. We know that she's failing mentally and has been that way for a long time. We're just trying to figure out our options before we have to make that final decision."
The problem is that he's not doing anything. I think he's hoping she kicks the bucket or gets hit by a car or something. She's gone from being good entertainment to being a menace in the neighborhood.