Weary but Satisfied

I continue to get impatient with myself and how quickly I tire.  However, I am enjoying being outside and working in my garden.  I just get to prolong the enjoyment as I tire easily and my projects take longer to complete than normal.

Today I continued to work on a section of my flowerbed that was overcome with weeds.  I'm working on clearing it so I can transplant more of the tomato plants that I started indoors in February.  I'm satisfied with what I accomplished today.  As I was filling my watering can with the water from the rain barrel, I also weeded another area of the flowerbed that was showing some slight neglect.  I managed to transplant nine tomato plants today.

As I worked, I noticed a mourning dove nestled into a hollow in the grass near my vegetable garden.  I went inside to get the camera so I could take a picture.  The dove looked small and I'm wondering if she (I think of her as female because she looked so small and fragile) was a young one.  I managed to get one picture of her and as I was trying to get more of a closeup, she flew away.  I put the camera away and then continued on with transplanting my tomato plants.

I made continuous trips to the rain barrel with my watering can so I could give a major drink to all the tomato plants and red pepper plants that I've transplanted in the last week.  As I watered the tomato plants in the vegetable garden, I noticed the green shoots of my green beans peaking up through the soil.  My zucchini is also starting to peak through.

Tonight was a gorgeous evening and I, again, took pride in looking at the vegetable garden.  In some ways I feel like my little plants from indoors and the seeds that I planted last week, are like little babies.  My mothering and nurturing instincts come to the fore as I coax the plants to grow using the water and the sun.  Tonight, I noticed that during the day today my broad bean seeds have also started to sprout.  My husband asked me how many tomato plants and red pepper plants have I transplanted so far.  I have six red pepper plants growing and over thirty tomato plants.  I still have more tomato plants that I want to transplant.  They will have to go into large containers as I've officially run out of room in my gardens for them.  We will use all the tomatoes, as we like fresh tomatoes and then use the rest of the tomatoes to make canned spaghetti sauce, salsa, tomato juice and tomato butter.  I can never have enough tomatoes in my garden.  The red peppers will be used in salads, as fresh veggie sticks, in the salsa and in my zucchini relish.

I'm tired tonight but I'm feeling very self-satisfied with what I've accomplished today while I communed with nature.  I want to share a poem that really spoke to me this morning.  How it describes weariness really resonated with me.  The whole poem very much described how I felt throughout my journey through chemotherapy.  This poem came from today's entry in "The Friendship Book 2012" that an acquaintance (but a stranger at the time) gave to me back in March.

"When weariness plucks at the heartstrings
And limbs might be fashioned of lead,
And the light which is shining on others
Can't get inside of your head.
When the ship of your dreams, having foundered
Lies wrecked on a boulder-strewn beach,
And Hope is a big, shiny bubble
Just floating away, out of reach...

When the warmth of the fire turns to ashes
Leaving you chilled to the bone,
Don't let despair overwhelm you,
For truly, you're never alone.
Be still, in the depths of your darkness
And wait for the silence to sing,
Then know an uplifitng enfolding,
And feel the soft touch of a wing."

By Tricia Sturgeon