Anticipation

When I start feeling the least bit stressed about something, my brain immediately switches to "what-can-I-look-forward-to" mode.  I start my spring semester of graduate classes tomorrow night.  Three days a week of 12 hour days, 2 days a week at home to do homework and look after house stuff.  It is a bit tight, but very manageable for a few months, especially when you have a wonderfully willing and helpful husband.  :)

Nonetheless, I feel like I'm about to dive back into the water, not to truly emerge again until May 17th. Most people have heard me talking recently about how much I've loved having real snow- snow that piles up in banks behind our house, snow for sledding and trekking and building.  The kind of deep snow that muffles the noise of life (or maybe people just stay home), but outside in the morning as the sun turns every branch into a diamond speckled scepter, it is blessedly silent- quiet enough to not only see your breath but to hear it.  The kind of quiet that doesn't happen during any other weather event.  Ahhhhh.

So then why today, did I find myself daydreaming of my garden?  Why can't I continue to enjoy our present state of wintery whiteness?  Craziness. All I can figure is that my coping strategy must go something like this.

Brain 1:  "Can I handle this again?  Four months of reading and writing and studying and family and church too? Am I crazy?  When is the drop/add deadline date again?"

Brain 2:  "Of course you can.  Soon that lovely patch of mulching leaves in the back corner of the yard is going to grow warm and soft.  You'll add a truckload of organic mulch and work your tools down into the earth and just imagine the smell... that earthy, mossy, wormy fresh smell... that's the smell of potential, of hope because what is more hopeful than a seed.  So see?  You'll be fine because you'll get to plant a garden before you know it."

In what world does any of that make sense?  Yet that's what I'm dealing with here.  Odd.    

Mr. Independence and Gardening

Cassie and I are planting a garden at their horse farm! So far we have, 9 tomato plants, 2 rows of corn, and one green pepper plant. Half of it will be vines- watermelon, canteloupe and zuchinni, the other half green beans, corn, spinach, lettuce and tomatoes. Anyway, the boys and I packed up our gardening and water fun items and headed over to their house at around 4:30 this afternoon. The boys entertained themselves with very few interventions from mom for a whole hour in the water, dirt and mud. We ate with Mr. Tom and Ms. Cassie, and then went back to the dirt for another hour where they were almost as well entertained. I kicked myself for not bringing a camera, but where in the world do you put a camera when everything is wet or muddy. Imagine three little boys, covered in mud, climbing into a round rubermaid tub full of freezing water, laughing their heads off, then jumping out again only to go role in the dirt and repeat the process. Needless to say we were all pretty dirty when we got home.

Snack, soap and stories and everyone was in bed,(Eric is at a track meet), so I decided to take a bath. I left the TV on CBS, ready to watch CSI as soon as I was done. I stepped out of the bathroom looking forward to a new episode only to find Isaiah. He is sitting on the coach with the remote control in his right hand, his cup in his left, and on TV...not CSI (thank goodness) but Larry Boy. He had climbed on top of the table by the TV, put the movie in the VCR himself and climbed up on the coach to enjoy a late night movie. One of those times when it took everything in me not to laugh.