RECOVERING MY LIFE

JUST A QUICK POST...
I report myself to be in a time of transition somewhat difficult to explain.

Remember all those posts in my companion blog, TheHouseAccordingToRoberto?  From June last year to just last month, I seemed initially to be spending a good bit of every day knocking something down or working with Daniel, the contractor, to put up something new.  A large hole was dug in the ground, the potting room began to take form, doorways appeared where once were windows, the deck grew to extend the width of the house.

Then off I went to Australia where I repaired and painted more of my sister's house for a month or two.

In the New Year, back here in Corning once more, the real work began. Dry-walling, finishing off, painting, laying floors, re-grassing the area destroyed by the earth-moving machines, planting trees and bushes, and the like became my story of the 'live long day'.  The weary quotidium mill went round and round, steadily grinding me down.

Then, suddenly with the last lick of paint and the last plank laid, it was all done.

What to do with myself now? became the question.  Well, lots still to do of course: to clean-up, fix-up, tidy-up...but not a lot of energy for it.  The last month of finishing off, with the summer heat and humidity, seemed to have run me down.

I decided to take off the pressure to get things done...not to worry about it and just do things as I felt inclined.  Fortuitously the problem of all the weeds appearing in the lawn opened a  way through this, thanks to the abundance of crabgrass. 

As I remarked last posting, this is the year of the crabgrass.  The initial dry conditions of this Summer seemed to favor this species which has outdone even the dandelions (that intrepid and persistent race of plants that ever seem to be taking over the world).  And with nothing of the virtues of the dandelion, such as pretty flowers that make excellent wine, leaves that go into salads, and roots that make health-giving tea.  I am sure you have never tried , and most likely never will try, crabgrass salad or crabgrass tea.

Instantly, overnight it seemed, crabgrass appeared everywhere, in what appeared threatening thousands.  On my evening walks, I observed the successive stages of un-let crabgrass.  Over my dead body, not in my lawn, said I.

Surrounded by this horde, the question was, How to combat the pest?  Was I to spend hours each day weeding this stuff?  Allow another quotidium to take over?  In the face of the impossibility of it all, I gave up.  A still small voice told me, Just pull up the stuff you don't like the look of as you go about, as much as pleases you to do, and then go off to something else.

Taking the advice of my daemon, I adopted this course.  Magically, the burden has lifted, the crab grass is almost defeated.  I found I could transfer this same approach to all the other things clamoring for attention.  What is more, I am finding time for the library, meeting with my friends over coffee, and putting miles under the tires of my road bike.

Still lots of work to be done on rediscovering me, rather like a diver emerging at last from the depths, I am looking around and noticing how life abounds.