A favorite poem and views from my garden

Now I become myself

Now I become myself. It's taken
Time, many years and places;
I have been dissolved and shaken,
Worn other people's faces,
Run madly, as if Time were there,
Terribly old, crying a warning,
"Hurry, you will be dead before--"
(What? Before you reach the morning?
Or the end of the poem is clear?
Or love safe in the walled city?)
Now to stand still, to be here,
Feel my own weight and density!
The black shadow on the paper
Is my hand; the shadow of a word
As thought shapes the shaper
Falls heavy on the page, is heard.
All fuses now, falls into place
From wish to action, word to silence,
My work, my love, my time, my face
Gathered into one intense
Gesture of growing like a plant.
As slowly as the ripening fruit
Fertile, detached, and always spent,
Falls but does not exhaust the root,
So all the poem is, can give,
Grows in me to become the song,
Made so and rooted by love.
Now there is time and Time is young.
O, in this single hour I live
All of myself and do not move.
I, the pursued, who madly ran,
Stand still, stand still, and stop the sun!

-May Sarton

Home

No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow.
-Lin Yutang

I arrived home, finally, Thursday afternoon. Driving into town, I was amazed at how much had changed in just four weeks, how spring gathers its March momentum to explode into spring. How the trees, bare when I had left, were now like green firecrackers bursting into bloom. Everything soft with life after the bareness of winter.

I pulled into my driveway and grabbed Babou to run up the stairs, leaving my unpacking for later. Inside, I noticed a bouquet of pink tulips on the dining room table! I continued on into the kitchen and saw a beautiful lunch and bottle of wine awaiting me. Hmmm...I continued out to the back yard where I found my friend, the bearer of all these sweet homecomings, having just finished weed whacking the back lawn which must have previously been in excess of three feet tall! The yard was beautiful; flowers blooming, now neatly mowed green, green grass, fig and plum trees filled with leaves, everything lush and happy.

I couldn't believe how lucky I was to get such a homecoming! I am stilled bowled over by it and am so happy to be home, so happy to see the old with new eyes. I have always loved traveling not only because I love seeing new things and ways people live, but because it really puts your own life in perspective. It is the perfect anecdote to ennui of all kinds.

Spring Hike

No matter how long the winter, spring is sure to follow.
-Proverb

Today Babou and I went hiking. It was beautiful. I hope this quote offers hope to all my east coast sisters!

That's all!

Growing Gardens and Babies

To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and to endure the betrayal of false friends. To appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know that even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Busy last few days with Diver/Mr. Jo/my husband returning home for the weekend, mother-in-law visit, and inauguration day fixation. I literally could not remove myself from my television screen. It was so exciting, so monumental, so dignified, and so profound. So inspiring.

I've been working a lot in the garden trying to get my flower beds ready for more planting. All my bulbs are up so I know where they are to plant some larger flowers. I am trying to kind of create a perennial structure to my flower beds that will be it's mainstay and then I can sort of accessorize with annuals. I had been replanting the whole thing every year but between the vegetable garden and the flowers beds, I don't have the time anymore. So this way I can just do some fun periphery annual plantings every spring and focus most of my attention on the vegetable garden.


I am really excited about my vegetable garden this year. I am planting almost exclusively heirloom varieties, and have been working compost in throughout the year, just digging in whatever kitchen scraps I have available. Nothing too scientific.

The plan is to rent a rototiller this weekend and dig in some fertilizer, We have never done this so I am hoping this will add yet another dimension of growth to our garden. There is just something so amazing about having this little oasis of a backyard. It makes me so happy. And Babou loves it too!

But she has been a little bit of a pain lately with it running through the flower beds breaking bulbs and smashing seedlings. Does anyone else have this problem and come to a conclusion? I want the garden to be hers too but don't know how to keep her out of it during the delicate stages? Any words of wisdom? Ideas? So far I have been yelling "NONONONO" and physically taking her out of the space and trying to give her her own little place and tools to work while I work. That lasts about one minute before she is back. Aiii! All advice welcome! Thank you!

Spring

Perhaps loving something is the only starting place there is for making your life your own.
-Alice Koller

Spring is here, I can feel it like sap rising through my veins. On my morning walks with Babou, and my excitable dog, I can smell it in the air, the smell of green, the smell of spring. I can see the buds pushing their way into leaves, the grass becoming lush. The wind is softer now and it caresses the trees in a way that reminds me of a mother tousling her child’s hair. I am in love with spring.

I am a bit of a fickle lover because I always yearn for, and celebrate, each changing of the season. But spring has always been my favorite. Perhaps it’s because I was born in spring and its essence was knit into my lungs upon my first breath. There is something contagious about it, about its enthusiastic celebration of renewal, of its thrusting green energy, of its lush display of beauty. I can almost feel the momentum, the great lifting of spring and it is so welcome after the rest and quiet of winter.

I am continually amazed of how each season affects me. And yet, isn’t it the most natural of all things to affect you? Life understands there is a season to everything, just as there is in life. It makes me glad to know that nature also has moods, and that each mood is dependent on the last and next; each growing in and out of one another, intrinsically meshed and interdependent. I am amazed at this wisdom unfolding just outside my door, teaching me in its quiet way all the joy I need to know to begin falling in love with life again.

Selah.