I happened to be out and about around eleven-thirty Friday night, and walking home from the T I decided to drop into the Victory Gardens — now that it's on my way home.  I hadn't been there after dark in ages, and I have to say I was impressed by the lighting along the main path.  But there's no lighting in the interior, and as soon as you're in the shadows it gets pretty creepy-crawly.

With all the rain, cruisers can't use the reeds for cover (they don't call it the Muddy River for nothin'), so they move into the interior, often into the gardens themselves.  Vandalism ensues.  I was shocked to see that my row was like a Grand Central Station for ghouls Friday night.  The magnolia in the decimated garden next to mine was like ground zero.

Now, I have done my fair share of cruising — back in the day, it's true — and in some seriously enchanting parks (from Pompeii at dusk to Parc de la Citadelle in Strasbourg to my beloved Germanus Gyula Park outside the Lukács Mud Baths in Budapest) — and I know what makes a great cruising park.  And I understand there's a delicate balance.  In the Fens it's even more delicate on account of the gardens. 

I was trimming rose bushes along my fence yesterday morning and chatting with my neighbor Bruno, who was doing the same, when a middle-aged man with mud on his khakis stumbled by.  He almost passed without event, but turned back to ask where he might find a tap to clean up. 

Visitors over the winter tore out all of the taps in our row, but even if they hadn't they don't turn on the water in the garden for another month.  I directed him to the nearest laundromat.  Bruno said he might consider calling the Hazmat team. 

We went back to our roses. 

"Hey, yeah," the man shouted. "Enough with the roses!"

Bruno and I ignored him.

"I mean, come on guys," he said, with a Rodney Dangerfield laugh.  "What's with the roses?"

I was like: "dude, it's a garden."

He obviously thought that the nearly 400 plots in the Fenway were merely an elaborate ruse — a pretext.  I mean, come on, guys, everybody knows this is a cruising park!  What's with planting flowers and shit?  They just get in the way.

Now, I don't want to seem prudish, but I have reached the point in my life where gardening is at least as good as sex, and sometimes better.  Certainly more interesting.  But even if this weren't the case, I want to be very clear: gardening need not be a pretext for anything.  It's hard work, and gratifying in its own right.

As for the cruisers.  If there were at least a few cute ones straggling down the path on occasion, I might consider cutting back the roses, but I think the Fens have succumbed to Terminal Troll Disease (TTD), a blight that sometimes destroys cruising parks from the inside (it has also been known to do the same to online communities, message boards, and hook-up sites).

That's why we've seen so much destruction in the last couple of years.  Trolls tend to get testy when there are no pretty fairies to chase around, corner, and rip the wings off of.  Unfortunately it can take twenty years or more for TTD to run its course.  Trolls do not go quietly. 

But apparently they're allergic to roses.  Good to know.