June 22, 2009

Greetings from the suppurating,

For reasons no one will appreciate for several generations, we are clearing a portion of our property to grow something else.  As mentioned here a couple weeks ago, this has mostly involved cutting down Thornapple trees and gargantuan grapevine.  With the right theme music, this could be the next Godzilla movie.

For the first week or so, Suzanne was obsessed with poison ivy.  She would not venture into our little jungle until she was positive we would not be infected. 

"Is this poison ivy?" she would ask, pointing at a leaf, which to me looked like every other leaf.

"No," I would say with woodsman-like authority, "that is a Maple Ash Bougainvillea."

And so it would go.  She would carefully step into the brush, patiently pointing and asking, and I would hew and hack and defoliate, stopping once in a while to look at whatever she had found that might be poison ivy.  I understood her concern, no need to be careless, but the woods are full of green stuff, and my task was to hack it into oblivion so we could plant other green stuff.

She studied the Internet, compared the pictures she saw there with the bazillion growing things in our yard.  Three pointed green leaves on a stem.  Very helpful.  Everything looks something like that.  She is a relentless researcher.

"Is this poison ivy?"

"No, that's a piece of barbed wire fence."

"Is this poison ivy?" 

"Well, I'm not sure, but that appears to be our dog."

The whole thing is ironic since Suzanne is the expert in all things botanical, whereas I am only slightly more informed than a well-polished doorknob in this regard.  I was a Boy Scout and my rigorous training taught me a few things about the outdoors, the central theme being that we are all better off staying inside where poison plants cannot reach us. 

Suzanne became an expert on poison ivy and thanks to her diligence we made an amazing discovery; it turns out that it was all poison ivy.  Everything.  Every plant we have is either poison ivy or it is wrapped in a vine of poison ivy.  Even the barbed wire fence is poison ivy. 

This discovery was confirmed by the itchy blistering rash that has appeared on our bodies.  And not just in the convenient places.  Nearly everyone in our family is chafing and scratching and oozing with urushiol-induced contact dermatitis.  Poison ivy.

So now everyone is asking:

"Is this poison ivy?"

"No, that's a mosquito bite."

"Is this poison ivy?"

"No that's a Band-Aid."

"Is this poison ivy?"

"Yes.  Everything else on your body is poison ivy."

Once the oil from the poison ivy plant is in your life you have to assume it is on everything you touch or thought you touched. Everything has to be washed and rewashed because the poison can last for weeks.  It clings to your clothes, tools, even your dog.

There are all kinds of suggestions for the treatment of poison ivy rash.  Like cures for the common cold, all of them seem to take 3-4 weeks to work which is how long it takes for the problem to go away on its own.  I have been told that steroids are helpful, but with some side effects.  Unless the side effect is another poison ivy rash, I'd be willing to try anything.

Someone said last week: "If you get poison ivy in your mouth and throat you should go to the doctor, because it can be fatal."  Great. Now that's all I can think about when I eat a salad.  Is this poison ivy?

So here is today's lesson: when in doubt, assume whatever you are looking at is poison ivy.  As a matter of fact, if I were you I would rinse your eyes with calamine lotion after reading this.

Hope this finds you scratching where it itches,         

David

Copyright (c) 2009 David Smith