 |
| Evidence from a previous year, that it usually works out! |
The landscape of this writer's inner life has been suffering epic drought. I spent several days down with the flu, too pathetic to even hold up a book. And passing from what I complained was near-death to blissed-out-but-Jello-like near-health has almost been scary, from a writing perspective: pfft -- no ideas to write about, and not so much as a phrase of inspiration whatsoever. Every line was like pulling my own teeth, the result, complete garbage. I've heard of lightning strikes changing the brain chemistry of their human targets altogether -- personalities, speech patterns and accents, everything -- and I'm a little worried a virus can do the same.
Or maybe it's just due to the change in the weather, and the biorhythm shifts that come with it. In any case, in the last week or so, Doug and I began our annual ritual of getting ready for the garden in earnest, and nearly murdering each other over it. Straight rows, or curved? Tried-and-true traditional methods, or strike out with some new idea that hasn't been thought up in the last 10,000 years of agriculture? Plant winter squash even if "one" of us hates them mightily? (Perhaps you can see which sides I am on.)
We're not the only couple for whom the first step toward fall harvest is spring hand-to-hand combat. About now, asking in bewilderment "What is it with the garden?" is as much a rite among vegetable-gardening wives as falling on our knees and weeping with gratitude in front of the first daffodil. Best I can figure, the garden is marital territory much like planning to have children, with the added fuel of actually getting to choose which genetics go into the living being that will be created. Not to mention planning in advance for the care of this "perfect" genetic specimen. That's a topic for a different blog, and a different blogger -- one with some actual expertise in psychology.
The hardest fought battles end up being the most dearly beloved partnerships. This will be good to bear in mind later, when fights over the garden will be in the actual garden, and we're likely to be holding sharp, long-handled tools. For now, we're back on track. In sexist roles, and I am A-OK with that. Doug set up the big seed-starting contraption (full-spectrum lights rigged by ropes to be lowered and raised as necessary, warming pads, a tangle of extension cords I would enjoy working with about as much as changing a tire). And I've laid the first babies -- I mean, seeds -- into their flats. With not much else to do but wait for germination, we are headed out for a hike on this glorious day, with our little filly on a lead in tow. Maybe there will be daffodils. Or inspiration for the next blog out there somewhere, along the way.
