I have discovered a deep love for gardening. I don't care how hot, cold, windy, or even sometimes rainy it is, I love to be outside tinkering in my yard. I'm constantly surveying it to figure out what I want to do next.
Of course, when you discover you love something, you start wishing you could do it every day instead of just here and there on the weekends or weeknights. So a year or so ago, I investigated a few plant-oriented career options. Without much luck, though. I thought about a horticulture degree, but the nearest college to offer one would take 1-1/2 to 2 hours to get to one-way. Not an option! I figure working at a nursery would probably take me down more than a few notches in pay, so that's out. My boss and I joked that we should open our own nursery and call it "Two Burned-Out Accountants". We figured the name alone would peak customer's curiosity to get them in the door, and our sparkling personalities would take care of the rest. But it was really just daydreaming talk.
Since none of these options will pan out, it looks like I'm stuck with the goal of making "Yard of the Month" in our neighborhood. We get a picture in the monthly newsletter and a nice description. I'm partially there - I think we have the prettiest border in the whole East Side of Fort Worth.
I think the best therapy in the world is digging in the earth and planting things. Here's a quote I found in an old gardening book while staying in a really neat B&B in Fredericksburg:
All my hurts
My garden spade can heal. A woodland walk
A quest of river grapes, a mocking thrush,
a wild rose or rock-loving columbine,
Salve my worst wounds.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
3 comments:
You're yard is really beautiful - I am just trying to figure out how a woman who is 32 weeks pregnant (that's about 7 months, Susan K., if you read this) can bend down and plant anything. I have a feeling it isn't pretty.
Thanks Mom. No more bending over - I've been on hands and knees since the 5th month. Which isn't very pretty either, but it works.
Kim, your passion for gardening seems to mirror Julie's for cooking. It's good there are those of us who don't feel a calling for either, who are satisfied to settle for an easy quick meal, or just having our plants struggle and survive through a Texas summer. For it means we can delight in and enjoy the wonderful accomplishments of others. Of course give me a well-stocked quilt shop, and you have lost me for hours.
Your yards have always looked beautiful - thank you for sharing them with us and the neighbors.
(And thank you, Judith, for keeping me from having to add and divide to figure out this pregnancy count stuff the girls have now.)
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