the garden this week---deep thinking and digging deep

Don't you love it when you have something to keep your hands busy but still

are able to get lost in thought?

Gardening is that for me.

This past week has been the first 'real' steady work week for me in the yard.
I am very behind and yet the garden has been so patient.

It seems that when I am digging and getting my hands deep into the earth that that's when my 

best problem-solving gets done.

So many things in my life right now are taking precedence over the garden and I have missed

the time spent in deep thought. 

I remember when I was a little girl I would get frustrated with the noise and clatter and lack of 

privacy that goes with being a member of a family with six children.

I was the middle child. 

I always craved a space that was all mine but knew a room of 

my own was out of the question.

The little farm we lived on had a grove of trees that grew at the furthest corner

of our property and I would go there to think and be alone sometimes.

Now, lest you think that I would escape to my little corner in the woods
to get out of doing my chores you would be mistaken.
I was very serious about doing what I needed to do

and have a mother who can vouch for me.

I loved this place of solitude and was sad when my little corner was sold 

to another landowner nearby.

I think I still miss it to this day,

 but I shouldn't because I have this little place of respite now.

 I have some things on my mind that need serious thought and this week and every minute 

before it spent in the garden has given me opportunity to do that.

I am so thankful for it! 

When I am out here alone in beauty I can do some compartmentalizing,

prioritizing and planning what is important to take care of first.
I find myself thinking about the things that need changing in my life like
 several character flaws that have crept into my personality since
'those' hormonal changes that come with a certain age
have happened over the last 8 years or so.
Like over-sharing, or the need to make myself 'more' because I feel like less.
Forgetting important things, or
 getting perturbed by things that never bothered me before.
Just call me Miss Cranky Pants!
I did finally go on natural hormone replacement and have been so surprised
at how much better I feel about myself and how little pain I am in now.
Talk about over-sharing huh? : 0!

So many of my thoughts as I work are on my sweet sister as she prepares for
life without her husband who has brain cancer.
I have time to think about him and some of the good times we have all
had as a family.
Time to pray for his children who will miss their dad so much.

I think it's good to do some deep thinking on how to improve myself and 

my relationship with others.
I think this has been my year to really take stock and 

do better and think better and be better.

I have always heard it said that gardening is good for the soul.
It has been so for me since I planted it.

Now let's just hope all this thinking and digging gets the job done!