Sunday, April 20, 2008

Something's Gotten Into Me

I've never been one much for yardwork. When I was a kid, my mom would send me out to water her impatiens. I hated that chore, I hated those flowers. Never thought they were attractive.

Another reason is that back in the day, I seemed to be allergic to...everything. If I touched any kind of flowering/blooming/green thing in the yard, I'd break out.

My dear late husband loved to work in the yard. He'd spend hours cutting vines and dragging branches to the street.

The first year after he died, frankly, my emotional, physical and give a damn reserves were just too spent to care how the yard looked. I was fortunate that my neighbors were kind enough to keep things mowed and generally neat looking.

But some things I did care about, read: send hubbie out to tend to, such as trimming back the azaleas, were just left undone.

I noticed recently these same azaleas were looking quite overgrown, and in the case of one bush, well, dead. I think it might have taken a lightning hit, or a curse. Who knows.

So I spent some time today trimming and dragging the trimmings to the street for the truck to pick up tomorrow morning. And I really got the best sense of accomplishment upon stepping back and seeing the azaleas looking decent for the first time in two years.

I also see that I need to get a rake and some gloves tomorrow to tend to the pin oak leaves that have gathered behind the bushes at the front of the house.

I'm looking forward to the raking, just taking on some good physical activity with a defined starting and ending point. That when you finish, you can look back and see the results of your labors.

Plus it would be a bit much to expect my neighbor, who is kind enough to zip across the street on his riding mower to take care of my postage stamp of a yard to also do the trimming and raking and weeding.

Wouldn't it?

2 comments:

100 Thoughts of Love said...

I love to garden....I start small but I find it to be totally therapeutic. Interestingly, my neighbor also cuts my grass...mainly bevcause he likes it just so; so I guess I should be offended...but i just let him:)

poopie said...

Now you're talking sista. Ain't nothing like a good session of yard work to clean out the cobwebs and make a gal feel special!