The leaf had white spots all over it, just like its sick little brethren. The bush it came from had been catered to like a prince. Mulched with pine straw, rejuvenated with peat moss and cow manure, watered like the rocks under Niagara Falls. I'd loved him like a son, and this is how he repaid me.

        “Lace bugs,” said Tom.

        We've had all manner of evil descend upon the yard this summer. Spider mites munched the burning bushes. Mildew attacked the spruces. The heat and dryness finished off everything else.

        Even the perennials are frauds. We love sun, they say. Don't worry about watering us. Just stick us in the lousy clay crud and watch us light up your yard like the Rose Bowl Parade.

        Yeah, right. The daylilies are bent over like old men. The hostas look like potato chips. Don't even talk to me about the Rudbeckia fulgida, chief, aka Black-Eyed Susan, aka Dead Scourge of the Backyard Prairie.

        The desert is no longer in bloom. There are cracks in the lawn that would swallow a Land Rover. I dropped a garden rake in one this week; it landed in Shanghai.

        I stopped watering the shrubs when I noticed that the saddle-wearing mosquitoes imported from northern Michigan had begun attacking in formation.

        But the azaleas, well, I never expected this from the azaleas.

        If you commit gardening the way I do — and I make Ivan the Terrible look like Martha Stewart — you have a pet plant or two. (OK, maybe you don't. But indulge me, all right?)

        I worship azaleas. One, because they remind me of the Masters golf tournament; two, because they are gorgeous in April; and three, because they are difficult and demanding in the local dirt.

        You've got to love azaleas to put up with all their grief. Just like some people I know.

        To cater to the stinking, spoiled-rotten Girards and Karens, I have spent more time in the dirt than Babe the pig.

        I have tested the soil PH. If it were any more alkaline, it'd be a long-lasting battery. Azaleas love acid soil. Of course they do. They're the Scarlett O'Hara of the garden.

        I've amended their soil for them, to make it more acidic. This is the plant version of feeding your cat salmon every night of his life. I've planted them beneath trees for the shade they need. I've trimmed the trees when the shade got too deep.

        I've watered and fed them. I've done every damned thing but buy them a diamond engagement ring.

        Still, they treat me this way.

        Tom the Garden God sold me some kill-the-planet liquid and told me to apply it every three weeks. A few weeks back, to end the spider mites, Tom suggested one of those pesticides that could kill off half the world's mammals before noon. For the lace bugs, he proffered some foul-smelling, skull-and-crossbones concoction that offs the other half before sundown.

        Ever read the labels on this stuff?

        If swallowed, drink water and “induce vomiting by touching back of throat with finger.”

        If inhaled, “Apply artificial respiration.”

        Note to physician: “This product may cause cholinesterase inhibition.”

        Note to lace bug: You are one dead mother.

        Not that it matters. The azaleas will always be beautiful and in need. I will always be solicitous and gullible. And wearing a hazmat suit when I shoot the killer spray.

        E-mail Paul Daugherty at pdaugherty@enquirer.com.

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