Do not adjust your screens. This is not a test. I am really here. Well, virtually here. As much as I used to enjoy blogging every day, I now enjoy not blogging. I like not having to pay attention to all the thoughts parading through my mind, like not having to pick the most salient one or the most provoking one or the most emotionally driven one to explore in a blog post. I’m just letting the thoughts go without worrying about developing them into something worth writing about. I’ve even stopped looking for answers to life’s big questions (and small ones), stopped looking for a better way to be or directions of where to go from here. I am just being here.
I am just . . . being.
Socrates was wrong, at least for me. The unexamined life is worth living. It might not be an exciting or challenging or even worthwhile way to live, but it’s working. I certainly have had enough trauma in the past couple of decades to last me a lifetime. In a way, the hits keep coming – death has recently claimed good friends (and acquaintances who were on their way to being good friends) — but these losses pale in comparison to the devasting grief I experienced after Jeff died. Nothing compares to that, which makes it easier to accept what comes — and goes — in my life.
On a completely different scale of losses, my sodded lawn died this summer. Even though temperatures were five to ten degrees cooler than normal, the sun was actually more scorching, and it burned plants that normally do well here, like the new England asters. My poor grass didn’t stand a chance. For some reason (good luck, perhaps) I did well — and was well — this summer, so I was able to work two or three hours a day digging up the dead lawn and the Bermuda grass that grew in its place.
It was good to have the work, because the summer was hard. Too many insect invasions — miller moths, mosquitoes, grasshoppers that gnawed all the leaves and even some branches off a couple of my young trees and old bushes. Too many wind and hailstorms, one that destroyed most of my flowers.
But now we are into fall. I have learned over these years of trying to turn my yard into a mini park, that of all the various seasonal gardens — from the first tulips in spring to the wild growth of weeds in summer to the colorful fall flowers — I prefer the fall garden. Nothing of course, beats the hopeful sign of those early spring blooms, but by fall, weeds that have been cleared out have stopped growing back, mounds of chrysanthemum greenery have become lush mounds of color, the grass (what there is of it) is still green. The air is still, the threat of devastating hailstorms is past, and the skies are a deep, deep blue. Even better, though hordes of grasshoppers are still here, they have stopped eating everything in sight.
I seem to have a lot of extra time right now — the new grass I planted is looking good, all the plants that needed to be transplanted have been taken care of, and it’s too early to sow wildflower seeds — so I am not spending much time in the garden and have not yet developed a new routine. But there are always books to fill in the time, as well as an occasional movie or a more than occasional game on the internet.
The housework I neglected all summer has even been done. The place is clean! Yay!
And, luckily, I am still doing well. I hope you are too.
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Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.
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