Rototilling Yoga

Regulation

It looked easy,
my schedule for this year
with its yawning gaps,
time to study form and function,
pine mulch and manure,
to cuddle late with a book
and sleep until I feel guilty
because my friends are out there

where I have wound up
watching words curdle
in the company
of Federal Register commas.

     [written a year ago]


Today I didn't watch words curdle.  Instead, I rented a rototiller and spent 8 hours listening to it drone with a persistent whine.  Not once in the field did I think of this, but now remembering the sound reminds me of someone on my staff a long time ago, probably because of where I'm sitting, among books, computers and a calendar.  Out there, in the dirt, weeds and sunshine, my mind enters safe mode.

Karen's day was very different from mine.  See her fine blog posting, "A Disturbing Day," May 10, 2010, at http://holesinmyjeans-kpannabecker.blogspot.com/.  I, in my pickup, borrowing the rototiller from Green Valley Rent-Alls, was blissfully unaware of sadness.  I was focused on ridding my field garden of wire-grass (Johnsongrass, crabgrass) to prepare the way for more sweet corn, melons, and squash, plus grain for our chickens, goats and turkeys.

Not once did I think of the fickle stock market, which last week threatened to make true my prediction of another 8,000 Dow, not that I want it to happen.

"I have a feeling you're better off in the garden," says Virginia.  "Maybe that's why Karen says she likes seeing you out there."