Thinning Seedlings

I plant seeds every year, as I’ve discussed in previous posts. Some years, the only seeds I’ve planted are the ones from Magic Man’s garden. Other years, I’ve started seeds indoors, then transplanted them outside. This year, because I pulled up six thorny bushes from my yard, spent several hours adding leaf mulch and compost and digging and hoeing and raking until the ground was smooth and rich and cultivated, I decided to sow the seeds outside directly onto the garden soil.

I mapped out what I had planted where, and noted on my map how soon I could expect to see results. Most of the seeds I could expect to emerge within 7 days. It’s been only five, and many, many seedlings are peeking their tender little heads out of the ground already. I have been faithful about watering, with the help of Mother Nature, and I threw a little blood meal and bone meal into the soil to give it a little kick.

I walked around my garden this morning with a steaming cup of coffee in hand. I saw the seedlings, green highlights in nice, straight rows across my cultivated garden. The problem is that I saw many, many seedlings. Too many perhaps.

On the back of the seed packet, the instructions say to thin the plants once they are 2-3 inches tall. I’ve never been very good at that. My logical and analytical mind knows that the plants that remain will fare much better if there are fewer of them to compete for nutrients and water, but there’s no argument that the spindly ones who don’t make the cut are not so much better off.

I want to see all the plants, faithful enough to sink their fragile roots down into my garden soil, thrive and grow and bloom. It’s just too hard to decide which plants have the best chance of weathering the forces of nature, surviving the onslaught of insects, wrestling weeds for water and nutrients.

It’s just too hard to choose.

I want to give them all a chance to please me with their sunny faces and buckets of bouquets.

It is said that the strongest plants have the most tenacious roots. It is said that dandelions must be pulled up by their roots, because they are genetically engineered to be able to reproduce and thrive even if just the tip of the root ball remains. How does one decide which new footed flowers have the best roots? The bushes I pulled up were rather shallow rooted, although one could never guess that looking at the gargantuan branches that scratched their way across my path summer after endless summer. How does one know the depths to which the roots extend, or could extend, if you give them sunshine and water and fertile soil.

I planted the seeds last week, not expecting any to grow. In years past, I have often planted seeds with no results, regardless of careful efforts to water and cultivate. This year, they all seem to have decided to sprout. There are hundreds of little seedlings, huddled together for warmth in this unseasonably cool air, too young to scrabble about for dominance, although that will come, I’m sure, as their roots respond to the forces of nature around them.

I see my job before me, and am both exhilarated and dismayed. I can’t keep them all. I might be able to transplant some to Mountain Man’s garden, which I planted this weekend. He was at first amused by my dirt smudged face and then dismayed when I mentioned to him the careful eye he must keep on his seeds. I might be able to move some of them around to less crowded spots in my own garden. I might even offer some to Magic Man, although these are sun loving flowers and he has mostly shade. Maybe SAHD-Guy might be able to give some a good home.

But I get ahead of myself, don’t I… I’m sure that surprises no one. The seedlings are just sprouted and already I’m counting their more mature stalks. Any number of things could happen to them. They could die of thirst, if Mother Nature forgets to rain and I neglect to water. The sun could become unseasonably warm and smother them in the moist heat of May. They could be trampled by errant twelve year old boys chasing fly balls across my yard. Anything could happen. Their survival is far from assured.

But still. I wonder.

How does one really know which plants to keep and which plants to ponder a different fate?

Happiness is….

I’ve been gaining back some of the weight I lost last fall. Just a few pounds, but I’ve found myself falling back into old habits. I still go to the gym every day, and still drink tons of water, but I’ve stopped logging all my food, and I’ve stopped stopping when I feel full, and I’ve stopped resisting the foods that I have always liked. Yesterday it was spicy jelly beans. The day before it was leftover mini Robin’s eggs from a stray Easter basket. The day before that was Dove chocolate with almonds.

I’ve done so well for so long, part of me wanted to just give myself a break, but I know what that means. My pants are not as loose as they used to be and I want to be able to keep wearing them.

I’ve thought a lot about my weight, my eating habits, my relationship with food, over the past year. Hell, I’ve thought a lot about those subjects my entire life. I spend way too much time thinking about them. I waste an inordinate amount of time thinking about, preparing, consuming and shopping for food. I don’t have a healthy relationship to food. And guess what…it’s the worst when I’m happy.

I’ve read about and researched all the reasons why, and I have classic reasons for having an unhealthy relationship with food. I grew up poor, and food was used by my parents as both a reward and a punishment. I come from a long line of obese people, so the genetic tendency to retain weight and to store it in my hips and thighs goes back many, many generations. I was raped by my father as a child, so the insulating effects of fat are not lost on me.

My parents showed me love, not by clothing me, or providing music lessons, or taking me to the dentist, or praising my scholastic skills or showing up at my school events or by protecting me, but by feeding me. It’s that simple. Now when I want to show myself love, my first inclination is to turn to food, and preferably, the foods of my childhood.

When I was a kid, because we were poor, food was rationed out, accounted for. One had to ask permission to eat anything. One had to ask permission for a coke, or a cookie, or a handful of chips…on the rare occasion that we actually had those items in our pantry. I remember my father buying several boxes of Dunkin Donuts and putting them in the freezer, the boxes taped tightly shut. Someone got into the donuts without my father’s permission. There was hell to pay.

All that is pretty and logical, but it doesn’t really help me in the here and now. I want to learn how to control myself, to overcome the childhood traumas and just be normal. I’ve learned that I will never be normal. I can’t be. The scars are too deep. All I can do is learn to cope, learn to maneuver around the sore spots to avoid the pain, or even better yet, to learn how to actually feel the pain, embrace it, so that the avoidance of that pain can no longer control me, control my behavior.

Sigh.

When I am sad, when I’m unhappy, I am feeling the pain and not working very hard to avoid it. I’m not hungry then. When I’m happy, I want to reward myself for being happy. I want to do things that make me even happier, and I’m sorry, but Dove chocolate with almonds makes me feel good….for the 2 minutes that it’s in my mouth. Then I feel bad.

It’s almost like I feel guilty when I’m happy, so I need to eat so that I’ll feel bad, which is perhaps where I feel I ought to be. I’ve never thought that I didn’t deserve happiness, but maybe something deep down believes that, believes that I am still a bad girl, and that I deserve the bad feelings that eating less than healthy food elicits.

I sure hope not.

Oh, and a word to the wise. Don’t even think about trying to help me correct my behavior. I will turn on you like a snake on a mouse. Nothing, NOTHING, will make me angrier faster than someone suggesting that perhaps I ought not to be stuffing something into my mouth. Rexford pointed out to me once that the tator tot making its way from my plate to my mouth was “pure fatty tissue” and did I really want to add to the inventory I already had. He still has the fang prints on his hand from that verbal exchange.

I think it’s even worse now, with a man trying very hard to love me, and me trying very hard to prove to him that I’m unworthy of that love.

Makes my role as a parent even more magnified in importance. I hope I’m giving my kids what they need now, so that they don’t have to deal with these issues when they are teetering perilously close to fifty.

Hope Springs

Every year, I plant the sweet peas from Magic Man’s garden. I plant the African Elephant Ears that I first saw growing proudly and energetically along the wooden fence in the back of his yard. Every year, I plant, and I wait and I hope. Every year, I worry that I did it wrong. I worry that I planted them too soon, or too late. I worry that the soil was too wet, or I didn’t water often enough, or that the birds ate all the seeds and the worms ate all the tubers. I worry that nothing will grow.

And every year, the seeds germinate and grow. The tubers push their green tendrils through the ground. And every year, I’m caught by surprise.

I’ve been having trouble with Mountain Man recently. I haven’t wanted him to touch me. Little things about him have annoyed me. I have been distant and have withheld affection from him. It worried him so much he wrote a blog about it. I felt awful. I felt like I was being cruel, and in any other relationship, I would have simply severed the ties, not being able to handle the guilt incumbent with the grief I was both causing and experiencing.

I talked myself out of it this time. I tried, as much as I was able, to talk to Mountain Man about my issues. I talked to my women friends, and they assured me that they go through spaces where they can’t stand to be touched, where their mates every move stomps on their last nerve, but they still stay together. Because, my friends assured me, those days don’t last very long. When the clouds clear, the birds sing again, and they are once again able to resume the normal and pleasurable aspects of a long term relationship.

I was IMing MWR-Guy, lamenting my inability to sit back, relax, and let someone love me. I wondered aloud to him if maybe my problem all along has not been so much that I can’t be loved, but that there are certain times of the month that simply make that more difficult for me. I wondered aloud to him whether my relationship might be ok if I could simply weather the hormonal tempest going on in my head. He heartily agreed that I should engage my umbrella and stick out the storm.

I wondered aloud to him that I never remembered experiencing this terror, this tempest, when I was married, and then it occurred to me that I am a much different person now than the Betty of the eighties and nineties. The past eight years have scarred me. I have deep trenches of white and viney tissue roping up my back. I am also teetering on the edge of menopause, while my marital years were smack dab in the middle of childbearing.

I read The Time Traveler’s Wife last week on the elliptical, finishing it yesterday as I rested from my week of toil and hard work preparing for a dinner party on Saturday. I cried and cried and cried at the end. I sobbed my heart out, first for the characters and their pain, then for me and my pain, which is what a good book does for a worthy hearted person. I thought about Rexford, about the intense love I felt for him, for the ache I sometimes still feel when I think of him. I thought about how wonderful it was being married to him, how I truly thought he was my soul mate, and I cried all the harder, realizing just how one sided that whole relationship turned out to be.

I trusted him completely, inherently, intrinsically. Is it any wonder that the stripes on my back burn and make me writhe in discomfort if a man gets too close to me? If I can still sob uncontrollably after reading a story of a near perfect love, eight years after having my near perfect love snuffed out, is it any wonder that my self-preservation instincts are still so strong?

I have chosen to fight my demons this time, instead of running from them. Perhaps it is because of the book that Mountain Man gave me to read, A Game of Thrones, about medieval times of daggers damsels and swords. Maybe it is because at the old age of forty eight, I’m tired of running. My knees are becoming arthritic and I just don’t have the escape energy I used to. Maybe it is because Mountain Man’s response to my pushing against him has been firm, steady, gentle resistance back. He simply tells me that he loves me and he’s not letting me go.

Now, I’m not stupid enough to think that if he has to fight this battle every two and a half weeks that he will not tire and turn away eventually. I am hopeful, though, that the tenderness and passion in the weeks in between will intervene on my behalf during the hormonal storms.

I cleaned the pond on Wednesday, and found a frog taking up residence amongst my goldfish. I don’t see him every time I go out there, but once in a while, he’ll swim along the edge and ogle me. I have wished for a frog for my pond for a long time. SAHD-Guy and my youngest son both bought me inanimate frogs with which to decorate my garden, but I wanted a real one. Kevin confessed that he and his buddy had found some tadpoles in the creek and had tossed them into the fish pond. One of them evaded the fish long enough to grow legs.

I hoped for a frog, but I never really believed one would come.

I had my coffee out by the pond this morning. One little, white, bent back of a stem peaked at me through the soil; evidence that hope springs once again in Betty’s back yard garden.

Mountain Man

I met the kids last night. His kids. I met the remaining remnants of the love he shared with his first wife. Did I say that? His first wife? Not his ex wife, but his first wife? That’s strange.

Anyway.

I met his kids last night. And it went ok. We didn’t join hands and frolic into the sunset, and the daughter thought I was nine years older than I am, but all in all, I only blushed once and that was when Mountain Man (I changed his name, more on that in a bit) asked them what they thought of me…while I was sitting right there. I saved face by immediately pointing out to them how fortunate they were because almost no one gets to see me blush, and they were privileged enough to see this rare sight on our first meeting.

But…

I met his kids last night. And it went ok.

He IM’d me the other day and asked if we had plans on April 26th. He asked if we had plans. If WE had plans.

He didn’t ask if I had plans, he asked if we had plans, because it was a Saturday night, and…sigh.

And we spend Saturday’s together.

We spend every possible moment together.

My heart aches when we are apart, like right now. A wonderful ache. A beautiful ache. An ache I wouldn’t trade for anything in the world. Ok, maybe world peace, but anything short of world peace wouldn’t be worth it.

Am I part of a couple now? Am I not a solitary single anymore?

Mountain Man. I changed his name from Computer Guy to Mountain Man because he isn’t just a Guy anymore, like all the rest of the Guy’s I’ve written about. He’s my man. MY man. He’s my Mountain Man.

I picked Mountain Man because once, as we lie in bed naked together, I asked him to say something romantic to me. Nothing like putting a guy on the spot, when he’s naked and exposed and your hand is perilously close to some very important anatomical bits. He nervously cleared his throat. Actually, no, he didn’t do that. I added that for dramatic effect.

He nervously cleared his throat and said, “I am the mountain, solid and steady, and you are the raging river, swirling, rushing, eddys of calm on occasion, but constantly moving, constantly changing.”

I sat up slightly, and cocked my head to one side, looking at him. “I am a river? You mean, like, hot and wet?”

“No,” he said, smiling. “I mean a river of emotion.”

“Oh”. I laid back down and was still for a few seconds. Then I sat back up.

“And you are a mountain?” I queried.

“Solid and steady.” He replied.

I moved my hand slightly to the left.

Whaddya know.

He was right.

(g)

Seed of Doubt

My neighbor died last Thursday. He was 72 years old, had been married to the same woman for 48 years, had six children and ten grandchildren. I’ve lived in my house across the street from them for 22 years now, and they had lived in their house for 20 years before I moved in.

We weren’t close neighbors, but we’d lend each other an egg or a cup of flour, or some vanilla every once in a while, and we’d wave at each other, exchange pleasantries, and never complained about each other yard or kids or vehicles or dogs. We were neighbors. We birthed children, suffered through divorces, bit our fingernails over finances, wailed about the injustices of the world, planted flowers and loved our families in close proximity, if not in great shared detail.

As befitting one’s neighbor of 22 years, I went to the funeral, sat in the back with my middle son, smiled at my neighbor’s widow as she followed the casket after the funeral mass. We went to the gravesite, said goodbye to the newly departed, and partook of refreshments at their house across the street from ours afterwards.

I sat on the couch with my neighbor’s daughter, a new divorced, early forties beauty, the mother of three chubby girls ranging in age from 16 to 10. We chatted about life as a divorcee, while the multitude of cousins milled about. In front of us, a young nine-ish girl, more than moderately plump, listened to the IPod of her twelve year old cousin.

“He’s gay!” she sneered at her cousin as she fiddled with the playlist of his electronic device.

“Don’t say it that way!” he countered. “What are you talking about. You aren’t being very polite.” He glanced nervously at me, who, I’m sure was open mouthed gaping at the two of them.

“Well, he is. He’s gay. Everyone knows it. He’s a faggot. It’s not impolite to say it if it’s true and everyone knows it.” She sassed back to him.

“Who are you talking about?!” he exasperated, grabbing the IPod, glancing at the tiny screen. “Oh, Elton John”

I looked at her angry and deviant face, glancing over at Greg. “You’re right, he’s gay, but what’s so wrong with that? There’s nothing wrong with being gay. It’s just how you are born, like hair color or eye color or height.”

She looked at me with disgust. “Nothing wrong with being gay? You’ve got to be kidding.”

At that point, my neighbor’s daughter excused herself, extracting herself from a delicate situation, knowing, as she did, that a battle might indeed ensue, and not wanting to be around to witness the carnage. I am notorious, in our neighborhood, for my left wing commie beliefs.

It was my very catholic, very religious, very right wing neighbor’s funeral, my neighbor’s house, my neighbor’s grandchild. Who was I to correct this child? Who was I to challenge what she had obviously been taught. And yet…if not me, then who to plant the seed of doubt?

I wanted to say so many things. Part of me wanted to belittle her, to remind her that the only thing worse than being gay in our society was to be fat, both situations are mostly genetic and out of one’s direct control, and wouldn’t she appreciate a little compassion from her peers as well.

I didn’t say that.

I wanted to tell her that if she continued to espouse those beliefs, then she was participating in the slamming of the doors of closets across the country, and someday, she might very well find herself in the position I was it 25 years ago; madly in love with a man who was nailing railroad spikes on the mahogany doors of his closet, only to find herself alone to raise three young boys when those spikes finally worked their way out.

I didn’t say that, either.

I wanted to hunt down her parents and demand an explanation for the bigotry they were encouraging in their child.

I didn’t do that.

I turned to my son and asked him, “What should we do? What responsibility do we have to educate the ignorant?”

He half smiled, patted my shoulder. “No responsibility at all, Mom. No responsibility at all.”

We left, without saying another word, but I wonder, in retrospect, if we were being honorable or simply cowardly. I don’t doubt that the time and the place were not ideal, and I struggle with the possibility that perhaps simply uttering the words, “There’s nothing wrong with being gay” was enough to plant a seed of doubt.

But I doubt it.

Ten Year Night

Spring is bursting forth all around Maple Avenue, warm weather being an effective labor coach as nature gives birth to new life. The greening is moving to the trees, a pale sheen of green blanketing the tall trees, the shrubs moving to deeper shades as the leaves unfurl themselves. Driving in the truck yesterday, delivering selected contents of my mother’s storage shed to a friend equipping a new apartment, I caught a whiff of wonder, the scent of crabapple blossoms, lacy branches fringing the trees lining Burns Avenue. It is a magical time, in anyone’s life. I prefer the greening even to Christmas. Instead of reveling in the generosity and good heartedness of loved ones, I revel in the gifts of nature.

I’m reveling in particular fashion now. I am soaring high on the love drug, on the pheromones of skin to skin contact, of strong hugs and soft caresses, and the wonder of waking up next to warmth and acceptance. It is intoxicating and heady. Computer Guy confessed that his work productivity had plummeted since our romance burst into bloom. I hope that his boss is as understanding as mine, because I know full well how distracting it is to fall in love.

To be in love.

To love.

I snuggled next to Computer Guy last night, after a particularly vigorous aerobic cardiovascular workout, and I sighed into his ear that I wanted to love him just like that for the rest of my life. He furrowed his brow, concern etched on his sweet face. “Well, I think we will probably manage something close to this for at least another ten years.”

I sat up. “Ten years? You are only 44 years old. Do you think people make mad passionate love only into their mid fifties?”

“I don’t know,” he replied “I don’t know that many old people that have sex.”

I laughed…guffawed, almost.

I have every intention of making love well into my eighties. Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and where’s there’s the will but no way, there’s a pill. As averse as I am to medication of any sort, in the love department, I think I could be convinced to put down my banners.

I snuggled back down next to him, touched his salt and pepper hair, smiled into his dark brown eyes, pressed my bare breasts against his chest. How interconnected I feel with his heart, his mind and his body. How quickly and deeply I have come to love this man, analytical mind and all.

But ten years?

I don’t call him Computer Guy for nothing.

And…ten years. Ten years of touching, of teasing, of tempting and tailoring, and trying, and tasting.

I giggle to myself as I tip tap the computer.

Those years will fly by.

The thing about romance is that as long as you feed the flame, the fire keeps burning. There are ways to keep the spark alive, to fan and finesse, and I’m pretty sure I’ve only shown him the tip of the proverbial iceberg. These next ten years will be full of surprises, I’m sure.

I may not know a lot of sexually active old people, either. But I know some pretty randy fifty somethings.

Especially, when the crabapples are blooming.

Wall of Fear

Breathless,
I sit in the aftermath
Of a weekend spent entirely in your company.

My heart is heavy with the loss
Of your quiet presence next to me.
Unexplained sorrow for our parting
Haunts me,
Which my head knows is temporary…
Until tomorrow,
Or even Tuesday,
Although my heart anguishes as if
I’ll never see you again.

This is the flowing part
of affairs of the heart;
The ebbing, the flowing, the eddying of waters
In moments of confusion, and the rushing that follows
When understanding shifts and the love flows freely again.

I spent a day last week
concerned about the disquiet I felt
when you touched me, and
As the tide turned back to want
And need
And wonder
I felt the familiar
Tug of fear
That I might be too much
And you might shudder someday at my touch.

I succumbed, finally, to your concern
And your caring
And your calm.
In the few moments when I thought I might reject you
I felt something close to relief
That maybe I might still be solitary
And dependent only on myself.

I cry now,
at the realization of how strongly
my defenses are built;
How high is the wall upon which you must climb
But I no longer fear for your safety,

I fear for mine.

Fumbling Through

I haven’t been writing as much, fumbling as I am through these initial stages of romance. Once the blush of new love wears off and both of you get down to the business of getting to know each other, there are a lot of minefields to work around. He shows you a wart or two, and you shrug it off. You pee in front of him and accidentally fart in his vicinity, and he laughs in good humor. He meets your mother and she says something embarrassing and all is still well and good. You go through your first bout of PMS and no one loses a limb. You yell at your kid in front of him and he offers no words of admonishment or encouragement, either for that matter, because it is still none of his business how you raise your kids, just as his child rearing is still none of yours.

You survive Chemistry Guy calling and begging for another chance, and for a few moments you consider it, because now Chemistry Guy is new and Computer Guy is familiar, but then you remember how your heart thumps when Computer Guy kisses you; not with the thump of the unknown, but the thump of the familiar and the safe, and the wonderful chemical rush that comes with trust. You remember all this and you thank Chemistry Guy for his thoughts and his attention, but you most assuredly convince him that his thoughts are no longer needed, wanted or required.

You learn to talk to each other in your own language, signaling thoughts across a crowded room. You hold his hand and introduce him to your biggest client as your boyfriend. Because now, you have a boyfriend. You have a boyfriend.

You look at the calendar and realize that this is the seventh Saturday in a row that you’ve spent with each other and suddenly, it seems real, like it has never seemed before. You realize that you haven’t spent seven Saturdays in a row with a guy for six years….six years! It feels good to know that this beautiful man who has been gracing your presence will likely want to spent the next seven Saturdays with you as well and you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

Did I say you? I’m sorry. I meant me.

(g)

PS. Happy 105th Birthday, Grandma. I haven’t seen you since I was 14, but I still miss you.

Pulling Weeds

I pulled weeds this morning, instead of hurrying to work for my staff meeting. I pull weeds when I need to think about something, when I need to process thoughts and feelings and the questions that surge through my head like so many ocean waves. The weather was warm, the soil moist and soft and loamy. The weeds loosened their grip on life without much of a struggle, and I felt like an avenging marauder, wreaking havoc and carnage on the unwanted and unplanned vegetation in my garden. The soil rained from the roots of the weeds, leaving barely a trace clinging to the wispy webs as I tossed them into a bucket, bound for my compost pile. Pulling weeds is a great outlet for frustration, for questioning motives, for finding the path to the answers of one’s own heart.

Farmer’s Blood

Busy season is slowing down, all the deadlines, the incredibly tight deadlines, have been met, sometimes surpassed, and our clients are happy with us. It was the easiest busy season we’ve ever had. The teamwork we accomplished would have put P&G to shame, I think. I’m proud of the folks I work with, proud of the clients I serve, proud of my accounting firm…oops. I meant to say, OUR accounting firm. (blush)

And outside! I’ve been trying to look out my window as much as I can, and last night, Computer Guy and I went for a walk in Glenwood Gardens. It wasn’t until this morning, though, driving down I75 with my oldest son at the wheel, that I noticed that the greening had started. The tulips I planted in January, which I had feared had been devoured by my resident groundhog, have all pushed their toes out of the ground. My forsythia has burst into bloom, yellow cascading flowers greeting everyone who rounds the corner of Maple and Charlotte Avenue.

But the greening is the best part of spring. The grass emerging soft and supple, the faint sheen of green canvassing the wildwood on either side of the interstate, the color creeping up every tree, shrub and bush…that’s what signifies the beginning of spring for me.

This weekend, I’ll sink my fingers into the soil, ripping dandelions out by their roots, trimming bushes and overgrown branches, shaking the dirt off the roots of last year’s cosmos and rubekia. I’ll start the process of making my little patch of ground the most colorful place in Wyoming. I splurged on a dozen packets of seeds from Kroger, most of which will not grow, but I will delight, nonetheless, in sprinkling them on warm and loose soil, and watching faithfully to see if any miracles happen.

This time of year, there is no denying the farmer’s blood that courses through my veins.

My oldest son was commenting as to the horrible condition of my grass. I guess that after I get a minimum of flowers planted, I should spend some time remedying that situation. I mean, a nasty lawn, with lovely flowers, is like expensive furniture on threadbare carpet. But, because I am so averse to using lawn chemicals, it will take a lot more sweat and blood to get results that will actually make a difference.

I wonder what my grandfather would have done.