it—I ain’t horrible to look at, but I also don’t got Kate’s All-American Girl looks or her personality, or DB’s charisma, or Hardhat’s redneck outspokenness. Like my parents, I’m a lot more comfortable out in the woods alone. The city makes me itchy, and Hollywood . . . well, I don’t get it. I don’t schmooze well or plot well, and I ain’t one of those “it’s all about me-me-wonderful-me” people, either.
I’m beginning to think I might be the next one gone if we don’t win again. Me or maybe Wild Fox, since he’s yet to do anything much at all. I was pretty much useless in the first challenge—fire is the eternal enemy, as far as I’m concerned. And I didn’t do that much in this one, either, certainly not as much as some of the others, though I gotta say I still did more than Wild Fox. We managed to win mostly thanks to Ana and Kate, with some help from Hardhat and the world’s vainest drum set. The four of them could have managed to win the whole challenge on their own.
Now, don’t be getting me wrong. I love what I got from the virus. I wouldn’t change it for anyone else’s ability. I wouldn’t give it up to be “normal.” What I have . . . well, it’s like the Earth herself wanted to give me something. Let me have enough time and enough seeds, and I could make the most wonderful, most gorgeous place in the world with plants and trees you couldn’t see anywhere else. I could make a genuine Eden, and that . . .
That I wouldn’t give up. When I put a seed in the ground, when I call it out with my gift, I can feel it. I’m part of that new life, rising and growing, taking in Earth and sun and so, so alive . . . Yeah . . .
Let me tell you, when I do that, there’s nothing better I can think of. Nothing. It’s the perfect gift for me. The virus gave me exactly what I would have wanted to have, and I know how incredibly lucky I am to have it. I know the odds, believe me, and I thank God every day for having spared me. My parents . . . they were park rangers, and they brought me up to care about the world we live in. I’ve been with them to all the big parks out west—Yellowstone, Grand Teton—and wow, this is an incredible world that we live in, and it’s our duty, our obligation, to take care of it. That’s the way I was brought up and I still believe that.
This show . . . It’s not about creation. It’s not about preservation. It’s all about destruction. It’s about being big and strong and breaking things. It’s about explosions and wild action. It’s about thinking of ways to get around what’s in front of you—and if you can’t think of a way around, then pound your way right through. It’s about being fast, about being the Guy or the Gal who solves everything.
I’m not sure I want to be that person. I want to make things, not tear them down. I want to take my time and enjoy what I’m doing. I want to think and plan and walk around and think some more and then use my gift, knowing I’m doing what I should be doing. I want the plants I grow to stay where I’ve planted them, to continue to grow, to become part of the landscape. To be part of the wonderful creation all around us.
These people, they look at their power like it’s a tool, like it’s nothing more than a big screwdriver or a hammer. That’s not the way it is with me. In that first challenge, when the fire burned those vines I made, I cried. I cried because I had made life, and I’d sent that life to die. For what? So I could win? Is that what I should be doing with what’s been given me?
Is it?
Heck, back when I auditioned for this, I made a field of pine trees, a whole little grove of them all around the judges. I thought it looked really nice out there on the field—lovely, cool shade, a bit of the forest in the middle of the city. And what happened to those trees? They sent the Harlem Hammer to tear them out, and they threw them all