I really don’t know if this Part 1 and Part 2 series are even of interest except to me. The underlying idea of time for a change is more universal, so apply these to whatever jerked you up short and made you say, “I no longer have to…,” or even ” I no longer want to…..” Two weeks ago I confessed I wanted to look through clean windows, and I felt no guilt if I didn’t make them appear that way. This week is crossing the Rubicon and not looking back when I stop giving my all to a task I love, keeping a yard.
The change may have come about gradually. Back when I was growing up – that’s like walking to school in snow stories- the yard was a family job. Daddy put on his fishing kahkis and used the push mover to lower the grass. A moment to raise your hat to a faithful reader who still does the same. Mother raked leaves and piled them under the azalea bushes and whacked back whatever was out of shape. I weeded the cinderblock bed Daddy had raised in the back yard for Shasta daisies and pansies.
Marriage changed the relationship with mowing. David managed near the house in Dayton and that ended his agrarian labor. His part was hired out. In various moves, I was the garden gal. I grew sweet peas in Dayton in memory of a trellis next to a garage in Louisiana. I brought daylilies from Mother’s yard. They multiply with water and love and bloom on Swift Blvd. sixty years later. One year David gave me forty pansy plants for our December anniversary. I picked out each smiling face, and gold would not have pleased me more. Russellia spread and attracted humming birds while asclepias called in the butterflies who left the cycle of eggs and caterpillars and cocoons.
At one point, I needed help. I had a yard lady who came in with her crew twice a year and did in one long day what would take me a week or more in daily effort after tending to family and teaching. As years passed, aging moved in. The desire was there. The getting down was slow and the getting up slower. I let last fall’s leaves cover the wildflower bed as mulch. Freeze week left a mess. I tried a leaf blower and instead of a nice pile to sweep in a bag with the fan shaped rake, I created “leaves that before the wild hurricane fly.” To wrap this up, the yard man for next door and I reached an agreement and his skill solved my problem.
I know the final step in adding decades is to open hands and release. My trowel is getting less use. Yet, I’m saving this writing and then going out to plant zinnia seeds in hopes of having a multicolored bouquet in July. I just rejoice that what I’ve been a part of was a continuation of one of God’s first gifts to man.
The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden. Genesis 2:8
Let Me Tell Ya 