Gardening

       I am inside the house now, after spending two hours doing yardwork. 

       Since the end of August, when we moved to our new home and its nearly one acre of property, I have not paid much attention to the yard. The previous owner’s gardening service has shown up twice – once to mow the lawn and once to do some much-needed weeding – and I have paid them when asked. Things seemed to be going smoothly enough, and I continued to focus on completing our interior improvements. 

       But when we got back from our two-week vacation, I found that the property looked a bit unkempt. Bad storms while we were gone (and another one that hit only hours after we got back to town) meant that the trees had lost the bulk of their leaves, which now could be found scattered instead on the lawn, the back patio and the front drive. 

       I wasn’t exactly bothered by this. As someone who grew up on scarcely-treed prairies, and had lived in high-rises since then, I found the piles of leaves to be novel and enchanting. But part of me knew I was supposed to do something about them. And, to be honest, I was less than enchanted by all the leaves that also found their way onto our carpets and my kitchen floor – brought in by Oly or Tom or just the breeze though an open door.

       So I decided today to do something about it. 

       As we don't yet own a rake, I decided to start with the back patio, and went outside with a kitchen broom and a white kitchen garbage bag. After only a few sweeps at the clumped and damp leaves on the patio, however, I could see that both would be useless.

       I switched instead to a giant push-broom left behind by the previous owner, and pulled out a huge green garbage bag. After five minutes more, I went back inside for some leather work gloves I had bought when we moved – just because I thought the idea of having my own work gloves was cool.

      And I swept and gathered and piled and filled up the bag. And I dragged it out to the street, since today is trash day. And then I swept and pushed and piled and filled another big green garbage bag, and dragged that out to the street too. 

       And I still wasn’t done. The leaves seemed rather resistant to the broom at the edge of the patio – where stone met grass – and I had to bend down and remove these leaves from the muck by hand.  I decided that come the spring, I would put in some edging material so that the grass would appropriately end where the patio began. And as I removed more and more leaves, I discovered that there already was metal edging in place, which had simply become buried under the leaves and grass.  

       I also used my hands to remove leaves piled around weeds that had pushed their way into the cracks between the patio stones. During the last weeks of summer, I hadn’t been bothered by these weeds, liking the thought of greenery taking over where it could. But today, I yanked at them, suddenly eager to get them out of the way. And as the patio grew neater, I decided that next year, I would use some weed spray in select areas.

       And it felt good to be outdoors, and to be working with my hands and arms and back, and to be bringing order back to our patio. I decided that I would buy a rake later today so that I could start on the lawn.  And next spring, I would surely get other appropriate gardening supplies so that I'd be better prepared for whatever awaited me.

       And as I filled my fourth bag with leaves and debris, I found myself thinking that maybe I, too, am like a garden. I too need raking and pruning and weeding and trimming. I too need the right supplies and the proper type of attention at the proper times. Perhaps, just like I had ignored our garden, I had been letting myself go for too long as well. 

       So for my parents, who called after reading my blog entry, worried that I sounded blue, I can honestly say that I am not feeling bad about myself. 

       I simply am feeling that it’s time to tend my own garden and see to it that things keep on blooming in years to come.