Quest for Creativity Day 18, Lesson 18: Inaction kills…
They look sweet, they're bitches to plant...
Today I ripped my fingertips to shreds planting 90 Pansy seedlings. I should have worn my gardening gloves, but… There’s something strangely exhilarating about the aches and pains particular to gardening. The stripe of sunburn just above the dimples of your hips from crouching down without wearing sunblock, arms and shoulders aching in weird spots and, of course, hands that will take a few days to recover from their encounter with thorns and rocks and grubs and sharp leaves… Gardeners are masochists.
Also, it’s been too long since I’ve just got up close and personal and hippie-dippy with earth. When your hands are bare, you feel the textures, you know how much earth still needs to be piled around your tiny plant, how much water you should add. You can feel it taking root.
I get it from my mom. Although I’m not quite on her level… She breathes life into something just by looking at it. She carries her garden encounters on her face and body like a scout’s badge of honour. It’s just another of her many, many hobbies and projects…
My mom does not believe in sitting still. You need to move, you need to breathe, you need to create. It doesn’t matter what you do, just do something. Inaction and couch potatoism is the devil!
Not that she disses simply being sometimes… You’ll find her at an indecently early hour sipping tea while sitting on the steps leading from her bedroom to the garden. And then… She’s just quiet, for a very short period of time.
It’s not always easy to live up to this kind of energy… I’m someone who tends to think and ponder and sit and wring every drop of angst out of a scenario before making a move. So it’s been tough, the past 17 days, to actually find something to pursue every day, something new to try out to keep my promise to this random quest of mine. To keep moving. Some days have been better than others. But so far, so good…
Find out more about my masochistic quest here.
Tags: creative mothers, Donnay Torr, dustbunniesproject, gardening, pansy flowers, quest for creativity
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