I only have compact, chaotic contemplations this week…
Last week my dad was hauling shit, this week I’m buying it from Home Depot for my flower gardens. Country mouse vs city mouse. Weirdly unsettling.
Six years after our house addition, the earth has settled around our house. The flower gardens are begging for real dirt. Four bags of purchased cow manure aren’t cutting it. I’ve ordered a load of black dirt and cedar mulch to liven the place up and make the flowers grow and bloom.
The Writers Institute I’m attending is July 1st – 13th at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs. Manuscripts are due June 1st. On Tuesday, I compiled 65 pages of essays to submit – 90 more pages to go. (I would gladly accept any suggestions from past Hump Day Shorts/Musings that spoke to you in any way. Perhaps write your suggestion in the comment section below?)
There are a quintillion new, ugly, unidentified weeds popping up all over our property. Their root structure is so intense that I can’t pull them out even after a good soaking rain. I’m surprised at how gratifying it was to spray poison all over them last week – oh, the power and control in the poisonous wand of death! Who the heck am I?
To enlarge my front flower garden, I laid thick layers of newspaper on the ground over the weeds then spread a couple bags of dirt and manure over the top of them. Another bizarrely satisfying spring act of covering headlines and opinions with… well, shit on shit.
The warming of the earth is bringing Grandma Murphy’s temperament out in me as I fight to control what's coming up from the soil. I don’t recall Grandma ever using the “f” word. But she could effectively string together a series of “SOBs” and “SOBs” and “SOBs” to get her point across. Fortunately, I’m cussing at weeds, not people. And, like Grandma, I’m not using the “f” word.
I’m the queen of double and triple bookings this spring. Fortunately, many of my friends are operating in the same chaotic frenzy. Years ago, my Sunday school teacher said to me, “Aren’t friends just the best?” Yes, Marge, especially in May when I have to make apology calls and send apology texts to explain my calendar mistakes. My friends understand.
However, I nearly came fist to cuffs with one business who said I was a half-hour late for an appointment. They most definitely had it wrong on their books because I had written the correct time down on the side of the Kleenex box in my van and had verified it with one of my sons who was in the front seat during the piped in phone call. Alas, I’ll give them this one, for 'tis the season of spring blossoms, Mother’s Day… and weeds.
After a 40-minute cardio circuit with Liam at the YMCA a couple weeks ago, we were heading into the house and Liam said, “Mom, I’m so glad you adopted me. I don’t think any other parents could take care of me as well as you and Dad do.”
Thankfully, the transition to spring is filled with more blossoms than weeds. To all of my mom friends and family… have a wonderful Mother’s Day weekend.
(P.S. Hop over to my New England Gallery for a few more spring blossoms in Massachusetts!)