A Week of Burning

A month back I was stung by the ever mischievous poison oak. Focused on clearing drains alongside a 2 acre slope of Pinot Noir in Chalk Hill I inadvertently stumbled into the miserable leafless vine. Without any green indicators to send out a warning signal, I dug deeper into the ditch without a second thought. Two days later as I carpooled south to Northern Marin I scratched at my arm, pulling my longsleeve shirt back to reveal a bright pink, inflamed patch of skin, about the size of a post-it note. The first images into my head came from the scene in Requiem for a Dream when Harry Goldfarb is on a dope run to the lower reaches of the confederacy and realizes his right arm is terminally infected. A wave of terror spread over me and I panicked thinking, 'Shit, my arm might be infected! I could loose my fucking arm!'

From the driver's seat I heard Big D announce "Shit dude, that looks like poison oak." Bingo. "Look on the bright side, at least you didn't get hit during mid-summer when you are sweating your ass off constantly," my boss reassured me.

For the following two weeks I tried everything to get rid of the urushiol oil that was spreading its toxic hands across my body. I was livid, rightly pissed off. I'm from the Northeast. We have poison ivy which my body is practically immune to. You name it I tried it: aveeno, aloe creams, calamine lotion, technu, origin, homeade salves. When I arrived to prune with one of the quadrillas coated in pink flaky war paint someone would inevitably ask "Oh, Tommy do you still have la hiedra? Oh, Tommy that's no good. Has it arrived at your huevos yet Tommy?"

"No no no. It hasn't reached the balls yet," I responded as a the jury waited patiently for verdict. 'Oh, those silly Mexican guys' I thought 'always kidding.'

A week or so ago I showed up to work with Eugene's crew to be harangued once again. "Tommy, do you still have la hiedra?...Yes. O.K., now has it reached your balls yet?" they pried matter of factly. What the fuck was this? Twenty questions into my personal health? I thought I showed up to the vineyard not the dermatologist. I felt like an eight year old being harassed by his hunchbacked grandmother with thick black bifocals "Honey, do you got that...that poison oak on your little boy balls. Let grandmama see it."

No stranger to honesty I admitted the truth. "Yep, at last the poison oak has reached my balls. Happy?"

"Oh, Tommy, that's not good," came the general reply.

Maybe the Mexican guys knew all along. Maybe poison oak always has a final destination, albeit an unsavory one at that. A habitual scratch with an infected fingernail can be all it takes.

Striding into the office on Tuesday after a four day weekend Big D asked me if I had ever done any debris burning in my extensive work history. Thinking back on it I could only conjure up blurry memories of setting boxes aflame to drift into the depths on Lake Ontario and burning couches in the backyard of the Death Trap. "Nothing to speak of," I replied, "but I sure as hell would like to give it a shot." After all, I had seen the Kiwis burning giant tree trunks and debris at McKean Estates as I slaved away, hunched over two-budding young savvy vines. Shit, if they could lean on a shovel so could this guy.

Wednesday was the day of the burning bush. The pyro in me was itching to set flame to the motionless pile of cordon arms still heavy with sap from their recent parting with the mother ship that was recently converted to cane. At first the pile was stubborn, insubordinate to my prods and coercions, but with a little liquid incentive it was well on its well to dandydom. Like a woman or maybe a feline friend, a good, roaring fire needs to be caressed and nurtured.

Stacking the cordon cuttings high I leaned on my shovel and stared intently into the flames, a spitting image of old Moses and his staff high on Mount Sinai, chatting it up with the Burning Bush. Now realistically, if a burning bush called out your name on the top of a mountain what would you do? Haul ass back from where you came from most likely. Or maybe pop a few more mushrooms and eat a couple smores. It all depends on your personal character I suppose.

In the old days it was a lot easier to cannonize the supra-natural without advances in modern technology. In this day in age how am I to believe a bearded exile talked to Yahweh via a burning shrub. How the hell does a burning bush talk anyway and how can you hear it above all the crackling? These are the questions my Sunday school teacher refused to answer. As you can see they still haunt me like a spider monkey on Aguirre's back.

As the first fire raged I was approached by the absentee neighbor's gardener who also seemed lost in a haze as he mindlessly circled the mock-Tuscan villa in search of his money, or maybe direction. Approaching me from across a buffer zone of bolted mustard flowers was the adult Ralph Wiggum, bald and pot-bellied. What follows is rough version of our exchange:

"Hey, what what are you doing down there," queried the gardener.

Hmm, let me see I have a shovel and a giant inferno blazing in front of me. "Well, I am burning excess debris from the vineyard," I responded maintaining a cordial attitude.

"Oh, I thought you need a permit for that."

"Yep, we have one." I swung around and shoveled a heap of fallen canes back on top of the flame. "Yiiiikkess!" I hollered feeling the heat.

"Oh, what happened there?" asked adult Ralph stupefied.

"Well I got a little too close to the fire."

"What did that feel like?"

"Uh, burning."

Adult Ralph continued to go on tangent after tangent: Did I know where the foothills were and that Charles Shultz has an abode there? Ralph's business was called Gardening Unlimited and in fact it could be found in the yellow pages. Also, he did a much better job than these "meh-hee-conos" that you just pull off the street. At that point I started to tune him out, but the man had diahrea mouth; he could not stop spewing. Walking away he got out his digital camera to snap a few keepsakes of the countryside, the mustard ablaze on the verdant rolling hills. "I'm taking your picture" he called from afar.

"Go fuck yourself" I hissed under my breath ducking behind the burning bush, my own proverbial savior. See debris fires can serve a purpose after all.

By Friday the burned brush piles were in the multiples sending my sweaty poison oak crotch into a tailspin. While Spring was in full swing the burning brush manufactured my old little sweaty summer. The poison oak has fully engulfed my poor scrotum leaving it in an inflamed, irritated mess. Do you know what it feels like to have your crotch hurt while you walk? You sorta have to pretend to straddle a giant ball and waddle back and forth. It burns, keeps me awake at night like a nervous parent.

To rap this up sophmorically, poison oak is just another vehicle for natures true brutality and unforgiving disposition. The moral here kids is to pick up a field guide to identify this dastardly weed or do yourself a favor and stay away from the West coast altogether.

'Til next week bizachos.

End Notes:
1. Anyone with poison oak cure alls please email me.