Planting Flowers

I spent today working in the yard, my yard (well soon enough, not that I am in any hurry for my darling brother and sister-in-law to leave).  It is something I had missed after my year in the apartment.

Moving took a lot out of me, with emotional land mines buried everywhere.  There are several boxes waiting to be deposited at the ex's father's house, things he had asked my mom to store from his childhood, because he felt they would be safest there.  Part of me feels as if it is a bit of betrayal to send them to where he did not want them, but the other part of me knows that things have changed, and as much as I have a severe distate for those who try to hide their past, his past is not mine to store.

And there were so many things that I came across that I had not discarded, because when I moved in to that tiny apartment, I believed that our lives would be rejoined in a year on the other side of the country.  So packing became an agonizing lesson that life is not always what we think it will be, but that it will certainly go on.

As I closed the door to that empty apartment, I looked around as I did a year ago when I first saw it.  I opened that door as a woman scared because the man I loved was leaving, nervous to live all by myself for the very first time, and essentially prepared to put my life on hold for love.  I shut the door as a woman stronger than I ever imagined I could be, taking the first steps in to a new career, a new love and a very beautiful life.  I don't regret the past year, not any of it, but I am pleased to be done with it.

And as I sat planting the peony (my favorite) bush in the backyard, and the 50 some bulbs of tulips, crocuses and anemones in the front, I realized life is a little like planting bulbs in the fall.  You dig a hole, plant a seed, cover it with dirt and hope like hell that you did it right.  Sometimes you are fairly certain you did, it is hard not to spot the pointed end in a tulip bulb, but with the tiny rock shaped anemones, well you just have to try your best, and hope it all works out.  Only time will tell.  Spring may come and my front yard could be filled with an amazing array of purple blooms, or it might not. 

I can only take comfort in the fact that last fall I planted the seeds the best I knew how and what I thought was a giant mess turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me.

Let's hope my garden yields the same results.