This time of year, I'm usually more than ready to start my garden projects. Usually, when spring officially comes, I've already been out there for weeks, digging and pruning, getting ready for the main event. Not so much this year. My garden is already looking neglected, not tidy or prepared for the explosion of growth to come.
Some things, thank goodness, survive with very little care. I'm grateful for that right now. Grateful for their diligent beauty.
But I didn't trim back the forsythia before it bloomed and I didn't trim back the clematis and now they're both growing all crazy and bonkers. I haven't pruned the ornamental grasses or the hydrangeas and I've only sorta started the veggie plots and my progress has been slowwwww…
I realize that the pressure to finish these garden chores is totally self-imposed and that the world does not give one single care whether I do these things or not.
And, besides, spring isn't only for the garden. Spring is for waking up to a light gray sky instead of a black one. It's for birds singing new songs, and in louder voices. It's for baseball and kickball and bike riding, too—even if it's all done in the rain.
It's for a light-filled kitchen at dinnertime and enough sunlight left after dinner to play wiffle ball in the backyard. It's for hearing the shouts and fits of laughter from the kids playing outside again. Spring is for simply feeling alive again.
The garden will grow without me just fine, even if it's not tidy and prepared and "ready" in the way that I want it to be. And, besides, who really cares anyway?
