I have really been wanting to get down and dirty lately.
(Get your mind out of the gutter. I don’t mean that way. At least not with you.)
Every day since my big gardening weekend three weeks ago, I have looked at my backyard with a wistful eye. But even though my enemy, WebMD, recommends gardening as a gentle, stress-free activity a concussed person can undertake, I’m not thinking it would be wise at this time. After all, the authors of that suggestion have not seen my backyard.
I need to pull ivy. I need to dig through the hard red clay that passes for top soil in this region to make holes large enough to plant shrubs. I need to mulch. Did I mention I need to pull ivy? Oh, and I have to contend with my other enemy, poison ivy, which has such power over me as to render me unable to recognize it in the wild, even though I rationally know what it looks like.
But when tasks like warming up a bowl of soup, driving to work, and reading the newspaper still leave me exhausted and lightheaded (by the way, a CT scan today revealed my head is normal) it’s hard to imagine I will beat the incoming heat and humidity to get done the gardening I want to do before summer’s end.
Which makes me sad. And makes me even more determined to get my hands in the dirt. You think I’m a girly girl and I am. But I also like to sweat and work hard and get my boots muddy.
Alas, for now the only mud in my life coats my brain.
