I had to laugh when I read my little "about me" and saw that I said I thought I now had the time to think and maybe write a bit. What was I thinking? As you can see by the date on my last post, that is definitely not true. I have been thinking alot lately. I have actually been composing posts in my head, but now that I am actually taking the time to pen the thoughts, I am finding them all running together.
One thought that keeps popping up a odd times is something my son, Andrew, said in his graduation speech. He made a comparison between my style of mothering and my style of caring for orchids. I have been pondering just how many parallels there are with gardening and parenting and life in general.
We recently moved from a home that we had lived in for almost 15 years, and I had been planting the whole time. My gardening style really does reflect who I am. If I saw something pretty or was given a plant, I found a spot for it. It never occurred to me to plan or design my space. I guess nine children implies a certain absence of planning too! We just made room for them!
A full to the brim garden takes a whole bunch of tending and some occasional pruning to keep it from choking itself to death. As long as I kept up with it, all was well. Then there were the busy seasons when I didn't get to tend the garden and the weeds would creep in and the garden plants would start to get out of control and start crowding each other. Every parent knows those times when all of a sudden you look and say "how did this happen?" When life starts rolling over you like rough waves at the beach, so many things can get put off or neglected until some unexpected behavior or rotten attitude makes you stop and realize its time to start pulling overgrown weeds and trimming back the overgrowth. Then with lots of hard work and a full dose of God's grace, the beauty starts to return.
Leaving behind my old home with years of planting, pruning, and nurturing and starting over in a big, wide open, pretty barren yard has been quite a mix of emotions. On one hand, I miss the comfort of my old garden, but at the same time I am excited about the adventure of my new one. This new yard is totally different from the old one; as different as the season of my life is now from the one I was in while I lived in my old home. Most of my children are grown and building their own lives now, and all of the weeding, nurturing, and pruning has produced a wonderful harvest. Sometimes I miss the comfort of being busy raising my family and identifying with other busy moms.
Now I am beginning the slow patient work of preparing the soil and planting my new garden in a new season of life. I find myself being just a little too impatient at times and have to remind myself that the preparation of the soil is the most important part of the process, even if it is the most invisible.
I don't know for sure all that will be planted in my new garden, in my new season. But I do know that it will flourish or fail according to how much attention I give it.
