Gertrude, Superperson and the Monster met in one of the ponds to talk over what they should do.
Gertrude swam round and round in furious circles. ``Oh we are doomed, just doomed!'' she wailed. ``As soon as it rains, the soil will begin washing away. WHOOSH! It will go into the ponds! The water will get silty and brown, and soon the ponds will dry up. Oh it's awful! We are doomed! So this is what it feels like to be doomed! I don't want to be doomed! I HATE being doomed!''
``Settle down, Gertrude,'' said Superperson in her reminding voice. Gertrude hated it when Superperson said that. Gertrude also hated Superperson's reminding voice.
``We'll plant more trees,'' declared the Monster. ``Simple as that.''
``Simple!'' shrieked Gertrude. ``And just how do you propose to do the simple job of replacing hundred-year-old trees in an afternoon?''
Superperson flew to Gertrude's side and began swimming next to her. ``Settle down, Gertrude.'' she said quietly. ``You can't think well when your mind is wild.''
``We can't plant trees. We can't do anything!'' sobbed Gertrude.
``Gertrude, please try,'' urged Superperson, ``Please settle down.'' Her reminding voice softened. ``What else could we plant?''
``We could plant seeds,'' suggested the Monster. ``Seeds of things that grow THICK instead of tall.''
``Only at first,'' murmured Gertrude. ``We still have to have trees again someday.'' She was still upset, but she was settling down.
``First we'll save the soil. Then we'll plant the trees. Does that sound like a plan?'' asked Superperson.
``YES!'' shouted the Monster. ``We'll travel out in to the rest of the world and look for plants that would be good to have.''
``We'll find beautiful things!'' cried Gertrude, ``Plants that grow in thick, lovely carpets that hug the soil!''
``We're OFF''! they yelled, and flew in three directions away from the Land of Many Ponds and out into the world.
They were gone for many, many days.
The Monster was the first to return. He was lugging a bulky sack. Gertrude flew home with a mass in her beak that looked like straw. When Superperson whooshed in, she carried a ball of white fur.
``This,'' announced Superperson, ``is dandelion fuzz. Each little white speck has a seed inside. Dandelion roots grow long and deep and the leaves are tasty to eat. But we have to watch this stuff so it doesn't blow away.''
She sat the fuzz-ball down gently and sat on it. ``What's in the bag, Monster?''
``I came to a meadow that looked like it had been painted purple with violets,'' he reported. ``Everywhere these little flowers grew, packed in tight as can be. I said to myself, `Now this is what Gertrude meant by a carpet!' I couldn't find any seeds, so I dug up some clumps of them that we can transplant.''
He set the sack down and nestled it under his feathery, scaly wing. ``What's with the sticks, Gertrude?''
``They're not sticks,'' she snapped. ``They're seed stalks.''
She laid them on the ground and settled down alongside the pile. ``I came to a grassy plain, emerald green in all directions. These seedy stalks were standing high. We'll shake the seeds loose and sow them for a grassy carpet.''
The Monster jumped up and began to sing. ``Yellow! Yellow! Purple and green! The finest carpets you have ever seen!'' He began to wave all three of his horns and stamp his webbed feet.
``Settle down, Monster,'' said Gertrude. ``Your work doesn't get done well when you are being wild.''
``When we plant these seeds, let's not mix them up,'' suggested Superperson. ``We want our carpets to be separate colors.''
``Not only that,'' added the Monster, trying to look calm, ``we don't know if one kind of plant will choke out the other kind.''
``We can use the old flyways for boundaries,'' said Gertrude. ``But we better not plant any two things next to each other. When the carpets grow thick and join, we'll never remember where the flyways belong.''
``OK,'' agreed the Monster, grabbing his sack. ``Yellow, green, and purple. No two colors touch. Let's go!''
``Wait a minute,'' called Superperson. ``What about at the ponds? Can colors touch at the ponds? We'll never be able to do this if the colors can't touch at the ponds.''
The Monster fidgeted and dug into his sack.
Gertrude took charge. ``Colors can meet at the ponds,'' she declared. ``That's OK. When you step across a flyway, you don't want to step into the same color you stepped out of. But it's OK to swim across a pond and get to the same color.''
The monster was impatient. ``OK, OK,'' he said rolling all of his eyes. ``Too much talking. These plants need to be in the ground. They'll die if they stay much longer in this sack. I'm going to start.'' He began poking his nose-horn into the soil and dropping the tiny violet plants into the holes.
``Monster, WAIT!'' shrieked Superperson. ``If you go rushing off ahead and I end up planting this dandelion fuzz in the wrong spot, YOU'RE the one who has to figure out how to unplant it!''
``Settle down, Superperson,'' huffed the Monster. ``I'll only plant this patch.''
``Yes, Superperson,'' said Gertrude in her reminding voice, ``please try to settle down. You won't be able to help us think if you are too wild inside.''
Gertrude continued, ``Let Monster plant that patch. Then you plant some fuzz. Then I'll sow some grass seed, and it will be Monster's turn again.''
Superperson sighed. She had settled down. ``I suppose that will work.''
``I sure hope so,'' grinned the Monster, ``because I have no idea how to un-plant dandelion fuzz!''