Wednesday, 07-July-2021 through Wednesday, 14-July-2021
Even in dark times, there’s always some sort of beauty around.
Thankfully for me, I didn’t have to look particularly hard, or travel particularly far, to find it.
After the service, and after visiting with family the following day, I borrowed a car and headed onto the road toward the South West, to spend a few days with my Aunt.
Without getting into too many personal details, her garden was lovely, and the disconnection from the world was exactly what I needed. We relaxed, I ate new food, we spent time reminiscing and just existing. It was good.
I mean, think back on when kids are young… what kid doesn’t enjoy digging around in the dirt, not worrying about getting soil under their fingernails, and just having fun?
No reason to stop now that I’m an adult… right? Doubly-so, since cleaning up afterward just involves a quick shower, instead of (probably) a whole screaming fit, followed by a dunk in the bath?
I don’t have much space to dig around in the dirt at my current apartment… which, frustratingly, makes me want to garden and dig even more. I did quite a bit of gardening back in Portland, but it was usually subsumed by the work Sarah was doing, since she did a lot more flowers and garden arranging… my planting has always been quite utilitarian – I like peas, and sometimes tomatoes, with a few flowers thrown in for variance. I’m not great at designing and organizing a whole garden layout.
But you know what? That works perfectly for someone in an apartment, with a small balcony and a few pots for my plants.
There’s a small garden shop that I pass every day going to and from work – I stopped in for the first time, without much of a plan aside from “get the growing things”. I came out with a dozen little pea plants, some tomatoes, and an Azalea bush – a small one though, so don’t worry about me too much. I got a few planters, some soil, and… that’s really all I need, right? Probably?
That evening, I took a cool-down after dinner to garden again. I sat out on my balcony, under the nice incandescent lamps, and got my hands dirty. Soil and fertilizer strewn around me, big watering cans to water in the newly transplanted seedlings… I’m feeling good about this. I don’t know how well they’ll do – they get pretty good East-facing sun, but who knows how that’ll go – but in the mean time… I’m happy. I’m glad to have some growing things on my balcony again, and I can’t wait to see how they do.
So… 2020 is a challenging year. Things haven’t gone super well, overarchingly.
But you know what? Flowers still bloom, and the world turns. There’s beauty everywhere, if you slow down to look for it. So sit back, and enjoy a gallery of a few pieces of that beauty.
