I have stopped trying to understand much of what is around me. Maybe a search for answers is a young person's pursuit -- that inquisitiveness that leads to discovery and invention. For me, at my age, it seems intractable and pointless. Most explanations are not fully accurate. They change over time. And many behaviors, impulses, beliefs are simply baffling, leading me to think "I'll never understand why..." And if that's true, then why bother struggling with finding answers.
I don't really know why I work so hard in my flower fields. Their season of beauty is short. No one sees them. The amount of work involved is monstrously huge. For example, today I toiled for six hours on weeding the beds. I still have the roadside bed, most of the Big Bed and the sheep shed beds to clean up, though I do think the lion's share of the work is "done." For now. I put quotes on done because it's never really done. If I stand anywhere at all, near any bed, I can guarantee that there will be at least a half dozen weeds within an arm's length that I will have missed.
I could be reading. Learning a new language. Volunteering somewhere. Writing! And yet, I hum a stupid song in my head, bend down and pull out one weed or grass clump after the next, all day long. Sometimes I think I'm batty. Other times I don't think anything at all. Is it an obsession? Or, do I work so hard because I can, because the work is there, because I like flowers, because it's good to be outside? Who knows.
Jet lag is receding. I went to sleep at a regular hour, I got up close to my usual. Ed is out until at least 9. As is Dance.
Me, I feed the animals then get to work on the flowers at 7.
I do pause for breakfast. I would say weather wise, this day is golden.
A little buggy, but when it's time to return to work, Ed sprays my shirt with Off, and the breeze picks up, and it's entirely manageable out there.
The day would end on this -- weeding, or me writing about weeding, except that I do pause by late afternoon. My younger girl is in town with her husband, and my older girl and I go over to the east side bar that got all the good press last month (it's called Public Parking) to meet up for a drink.
My girls...
Don't you ever ask them why, If they told you you would cry, So just look at them and sigh, And know they love you... (CS&N)
My girls are the big storytellers when we get together and kids are not a distraction. Listening to them, I have this strong surge of gratitude, of indescribable love. My good friend lost his daughter to cancer last night. One of those imponderables. How could this happen to a her, to him? (And sadly, he is not the first friend of mine to lose a child in this way.)
I am the lucky one tonight. Here I am, laughing with these two as they poke fun at my weather obsession (what? you haven't noticed??), at our various eating preferences, at the absurdities of their days. The thrill of being with them is so deep! It is one beautiful break from work in the garden!
At home now with Ed, with our show watching, our supper, our squares of chocolate. Again, with love and gratitude.
