Dirt Therapy

I'm quite sure that if you looked up "Grizzly Bear" on Wikipedia today, you would have seen my picture. I woke up snarly and snarled a good part of the day. As the sun shone brightly and the birds sang their lovely little morning song, I grumbled. As the cat meowed, I asked her -- none too politely -- to ...uh... "be quiet" (or words with a similar meaning). I had commentary on the relative intelligence of every driver in Chicago. The sun continued to shine and the birds kept up their song. I ran my many errands, left an irritated message on the phone of the person who dared not call me back, received the water meter guy into my home with some semblance of hospitality. Pulled the laundry out of the dryer with a grumble.

And then I noticed the sun was shining and the birds were singing. On went the gardening clothes and out went this grizzly bear (and grumbling cat) to see what the soil might have to say. Now, it was really too wet to do any digging, but I tried to put in carrots and another set of peas. I pulled last year's corn stalks out of the ground and tore them up for mulch and compost. I removed more leaves from the garden and noticed mint taking over one of the beds. I stopped to inspect the vibernum, stopped and gazed at the hostas coming out under the tree out front. I picked up my conversation with the worms from where we had left off. I said hello to Mr. Cottontail as he poked a nose in to see the goings on (and tried, I think, to figure out how to work the garden gate). I knelt down close to the budding lettuce. I started the seeds for the tomatoes, eggplant, basil and jalepeno and put them under their warm, bright light in the basement. The cat rolled around in the dirt and sat in the sunlight and stopped her meowing. I got dirt lodged deep under my nails. I breathed in the smell of the soil like I would an essential oil. And the bear melted back into a woman.

The sun shone, the birds sang. And I smiled.