
I Was Gnomed
The Web is No Bed of Roses
Dear Diary,
It’s been a while, and I wouldn’t blame you if you were upset.
I was lured away from your creamy pages by the blue glow of the web. It’s no excuse, but everyone was doing it. Blogging that is. “A diary? Really?” they said. “Get with it.”
Why did I listen? Why? Was it my fear of judgement? My niggling desire for notoriety? The convenience of a smartphone?
I thought I was playing it safe. “I’ll write about gardening,” I said to myself. “What could be more benign? Who doesn’t like flowers and butterflies?”
Everything was fine back when I had two followers. Then my spring piece, Creating a Hosta Environment, went viral. O.M.G! The gnomes came out from under their toadstools.
Feminists were all up my asterisk for the line, “Hostas are a girl’s best friend.” Apparently, though I thought I was being funny, I was demeaning women everywhere. Men’s rightsers were all over the same words, claiming I had ignored the very real needs and feelings of male gardeners, men who had carved this country out of the wilderness so I could plant my flowers like the pansy that I was.
Sheesh!
Summer came, and I wrote Getting Horny about my battle with tomato hornworms.
Christians, who never got past the title, were suddenly berating my morals and claiming people like me were why our nation was going down the tubes.
Far worse were the vegans. They sent death threats, all in a lather that hornworms had just as much right to live as I did, perhaps more. You would have thought I’d roasted a puppy on a spit. All I did was toss the greedy things into the woods across the road with a “good luck making it back to my patch.”
What finally got me kicked off Medium was my autumn yard cleanup piece on how to make kindling from fallen twigs, Binding Faggots. I received a message from User Happiness. My bad. I used the English language inappropriately.
So here I am. It feels awfully good to be back between your sheets after my electric fling.
Why did I ever leave you? You’re the only one who understands.

