Saturday, March 29, 2008

spring? is that you?

Spring has been very slow in arriving this year. Not that i ever enjoy winter, but, when it drags on so long, & so bitterly, it leaves me... bitter. Thankfully, the days are consecutively above freezing now, & alive things are starting to appear. This afternoon, to celebrate, my boyfriend drove me out into the country so i could go to a nursery where my family has taken me to my entire life. For the most part, all nurseries & plant farms produce a similarly pleasant nostalgia, which tends to result in unnecessary hours (& dollars) spent maintaining this green bliss. However enjoyable a trip to a nursery is, no other place can compare to the utter nirvana represented by this plant farm. Two-hundred acres of farm: over a dozen greenhouses, sheep (another blissful childhood memory,) burros, cats... everything alive & happy & beautiful. Bliss.
Sadly, i did not inherit my mother's green thumb. I cannot grow things. At all. I'll admit that it's largely due to a complete lack of sunlight in our antique neighborhood, but even house plants are hit & miss for me. I don't always kill everything, don't get the wrong impression, but it takes a pretty tough plant to survive my lifestyle. The ones that do, last forever. Knowing this, i buy lots of plants, every year. Probably two-thirds of them die, so i like to keep my odds high by getting a large number of them.
To date, the only successful gardening venture at this house has been my spring bulbs. This is the second year for them to bloom, which is enormously rewarding, since i don't have to do a damned thing, & they'll always reappear. One afternoon of hard work, years of enjoyment. It does make me a little mournful when i consider the reality that, once i've left this house, & it is occupied by other, more careless tenets, the tulips & daffodils & muscari that i love so dearly, will be forgotten & trampled beneath cigarette butts & PBR cans. Consistently, i remind myself what an important lesson in zen living this is: Sometimes, after planting a garden, you will abandon it.

Thursday, March 27, 2008

a lot.

I talk a lot. A lot. It's not intentional, or something i'm unaware of, it's just something about myself that i have yet to discover how to control (like not flinching when there's a rubber band pointed at me or laughing when people fall down.) Every thing i do, i do a lot. I take photos. A lot. I love a lot. So much, a lot. So completely, entirely, a lot. The only plausible (preferable) explanation that i have happened upon is that i just have to much clutter in the brain box, & not enough organization to conquor it.
I used to write a lot. Constantly, a lot. Until one day. It stopped. I was glad for it, in a way, because, while i had lots & lots of words (like, loquacious,) & a lot of interesting ways to use them, i never really had very much to say. Sadly, this is the same way i would categorize my speaking habits.
SO! In comes a blog. Which, despite the idea of anonymity (of which i am so fond,) has been nearly impossible to write. Nothing to say, i suppose. I have the hardest time starting anything. The idea of finality is paralyzing. I can never name pets, or start sketchbooks. I have half a dozen address books that i've never written an entry in! 'What if i lose that pen?' 'What if he doesn't turn out to be much of a Berlioz?'
But now this is done, typed. So perhaps, talking (a lot,) can become blogging a lot. It's still writing, & it's still communicating. Let's hope it works. Blogging. About nothing to particular, to no specific style or subject. Plenty of room to grow & talk about art &/or world issues &/or how dumb everyone is &/or sex (well, maybe not, because nobody likes a negative nelly, & world issues sure are a downer, debbie.)