What's Your Therapy?

I'm not sure how it happened in the assembly line of creation when stress relief techniques were assigned. But the angel in charge of giving me gardening, cleaning and exercise as a means to relieving stress was on break, and the substitute thought it would be funny to give me shopping, eating and web surfing as stress relievers. The plan works like a charm and I tend to spend too much, eat too much and waste way too much time on the 'net if I need to 'chill out'.

This time of year, I hear so many people say how therapeutic gardening is for them, and as my flower beds get ever weedier (the ones I was shamed into creating a couple of summers ago) I pump myself up and tell myself just how relaxed I'm going to be as I zone out and create beauty for my family and me to enjoy. Today I'd had it with the empty flower pots lining my front porch, all shiny and new, ready to be filled with something...anything. I bought them in an attempt to motivate myself into putting something green in the cute little pastel containers complete with the curvy handle that hangs over the top of the railing, suspending them on the front of the porch. After several weeks of procrastinating, my last excuse (frost) is all but over. I had to accept that Memorial Day had come and gone, and I still had nary a plant to brag about. Now you who know me realize I'm a gadget girl, so I have a fully stocked shed complete with every gardening tool - I don't even know what they're all called - but I have them in case I need them.

I finally broke down today, went to the garden center, picked out some cute little plants and I have no idea whether they will survive the week or not. They say sun/shade. Will it be okay if the sun shines on them all day? They fit in the containers, but a bit snugly. Will they suffocate to death? Some of the blooms are dying. Do they need to be plucked? How is it therapy if there isn't someone to keep asking '"nd how do you feel about that?" I feel that it would be better if my flowers were planted by a gardner who actually knew something about gardening.

Then after the planting comes the weeding - pulling stalks, prickers, weeds, roots...things that refuse to come out of the ground and will only be popping their weedy little heads up again in another few days. I mean, what's the point? Instead of feeling relaxed, rejunvenated, serene? I feel anxious, sweaty and itchy. But I continue like a madwoman, performing the equivalent of botanic surgery - well, murder actually, to anything that looks remotely too green and big to possibly be a decorative plant thing.

I've said all this to say, I'm in the market for a gardener in exchange for therapy. I'll be happy to have some beautiful looking plants, and you'll be happy because you're healing your inner self. You go around planting my stuff and pulling my weeds and I'll follow behind you asking "and how do you feel about that?" We'll make a great pair.