O Lord, after a six-week drought, I’d almost forgotten what Your rain symphonies sounded like, with percussive rumbles of thunder and gentle droplet harmonies. My flowers thank You, and so do I, as I’m sick and tired of their complaints.
One thing both flowers and this gardener have learned, though, during every growing/blooming season: whatever the “omnipotent” Weather Channel decrees, You are the one in charge.
Image by Shafin Al Asad Protic from Pixabay.
Gardening addicts. Never leave them alone at a garden center or nursery, where obliging, devious personnel help them take out a second mortgage to buy the last bougainvillea. This, though the tropical lovelies prefer Argentina over Indiana.
Younger junkies fall victim to buying binges after watching HGTV. However, gardening addiction does its worst damage in women of a certain age.
They should know better than to trust this mad urge to nurture. Most spent decades caring for little humans. They’ve repressed memories of endless feedings — and the waterings with which baby sprouts responded. These women dealt daily with mountains of fertilizer. Eventually wising up, they limited the number of nurturees they’d cultivate.
However, spring gardening regenerates the madness. While spouses are playing golf, the women load up with 35 flats of annuals, 37 bags of potting soil and barrels of pansies, adding just one more hanging basket here. Another there. How can they ignore wilted tomato seedlings? With their TLC, the weaklings will flourish.
Addicts.
With symptoms listed below, I hope to alert family and friends of this malady.
Signs of Gardening Addiction
Early Level
Second Level
Third Level
Final Level
I am proud to inform readers, as well as my spouse, that today, I didn’t brag to a single stranger about green beans or zucchini. I bypassed needy tomato seedlings. I kept my regular cart and made a single purchase.
“Only one?” Hubby blinks in disbelief.
“Only one,” I assure him.
Your Extraordinary Ordinary: Are you a gardening addict?
Reading this title, even I think I ought to get out more. Who spends Saturday nights holding a hose?
Of course, I blame my parents for my less-than-wild lifestyle. Mom, a pastor’s wife with five stair-step children, gladly would have enjoyed a few uninterrupted minutes to do nothing but water petunias and breathe. But with little time to do either, she elected me.
I almost preferred babysitting my brothers. At least, they did exciting things like setting the sofa afire. Still, I created excitement when the little creeps ventured too close, spraying them into the stratosphere.
Mostly, though, I considered watering in the same class as listening to my dad preach. Both were good things I should do, but the tasks seemed to go on forever and ever, amen.
With young adulthood, watering ended. Watering fairies in apartment complexes waved magic hoses, keeping grass and flowers bright and pretty as a box of Crayolas. However, when Hubby and I rented our first house, we found, to our shock, that the watering fairies hadn’t jumped onto the moving truck.
When we built our first house, I served as Mommy to the new lawn, as well as to three children. The Goddess of Liquid, supervising input and output, all I did was nurse babies, diaper babies and water grass.
Though the job description has narrowed, I still spend hours and dollars every summer hydrating our arid property. Spending less money and effort, I could buy veggies and flowers at the grocery. But even beyond the scrumptiousness of homegrown stuff, watering presents other positives.
For me, it fills the place that being a soccer mom once held. Then, I could justify a chaotic house and a car resembling a McDonald’s dumpster on wheels in the name of supporting my children. Privately, though, other soccer moms and I considered our noble pastime legalized loafing.
But my children grew up. So, I’ve created a whole new concept.
If I water the flower bed near the street, half of Upland’s population walks/bikes/ Rollerblades past. Cute babies wave from strollers. Drivers stop dead in the middle of the street for conversation. I connect with neighbors, also looking noble as they water. And why not? We are greening the earth, as well as nurturing our inner loafers.
Actually, I keep quite busy while I water. Mentally scanning cabinets and fridge, I formulate grocery lists. I ponder my position on abortion. I review knock-knock jokes for our grandson. I pray for our sick neighbor. I count fireflies. I watch a dead-end street baseball game. I decide how to kill off the victim in my next novel. …
Who says watering isn’t exciting?
Your Extraordinary Ordinary: Are you the watering fairy in your family?