Still, in the seemingly mundane tasks of composting, mulching, raking, weeding, seeding, feeding, thinning, staking, there was serenity and beauty.
“Jonathan? I made some sandwiches. Are you hungry?”
Jonathan straightened up from the vegetable garden where he’d been pulling weeds. He smiled over at his wife who stood under the rose arbour in a red nimbus created by the swollen buds of the Black Ruby roses. “Thanks, sweetheart. I’m starved.”
Ginny was holding a tray with a stack of thick sandwiches and two tall sweating glasses of pale ale. “I’ve set the table on the patio.”
“Be right there.” Jonathan stripped off his gloves and stretched out his back. It gave a satisfying creak. He’d get back to the weeding after lunch. Or maybe he’d skip the afternoon weeding and finally finish reading that novel he’d started last month and never got through. His best friend had recommended it, but he couldn’t see why. Full of underdeveloped characters and plots with more twists than the kiwi vine climbing the garage trellis. It would be a shame to spoil such a beautiful day with bad writing. With the sun happily watching the wind chase the clouds (Ginny called them blinking days), he couldn’t think of a finer spot to spend time than in their favorite sky-watch place—the old hammock under the sugar maple.
ktn © 2011
*I've been trying to reply to comments on my blog since yesterday and keep getting an error message. I'll keeping trying. Eventually Blogger will let me, I hope!
27 comments:
How to make yard work entertainment- like the title especially!
That clean-up may never end here! So far behind with all the rain. I know that creak well...
Sounds like a great time your character is having!
I had to make my own sandwich, n only had an hour of dry-ish to play with. Feels good to make any progress tho...
Hope you're getting in some similar quality time enjoying the "Blinking Days" like Jonathan-
So full of joy, of simplicity of things that matter, you bring it to a place of happiness, excellent my friend
A kewl little slice of country suburbia heaven.
Talon...
To some, it's like Fishing.
It's what you love, and it's better than taking a tranquilizer!
I just Love your bucolic insights.
And this explains why I love to escape to the garden as often as I can. :)
Love the wispy clouds too.
aww sweet with the splendor of simple pleasures....
It may be a fiction piece but it does seem odd that people not that long ago had days like this piece described. When in the hell did the world speed up to breakneck pace?
LOL, oh the temptation to do nothing! (I give in to it regularly)
What a sky and sweet story, too.
nice...i could use some of that hammock time...you capture the joy of simplicity in this...and it feels very nice...
mmmm, I have always wanted a hammock day - sounds lovely.
Hi Talon .. love the common grackle - had to look him up .. wonderful name!
Lovely story .. the garden can be long bursts, or short .. but the tale is mainly the same - just variants .. love the thought & that high nimbus cloud sitting so beautifully in the sky ..
Cheers Hilary
Such a beautiful story!
Loved it!
My husband finds serenity in weeding..and joy in biking...they both come at the same time of the year and that creates quite a bit of conflict.
I hope my body will let me take care of the yard for the 5 weeks he is gone this year on his bike tour...I am not planting any veggies because I just know I could not handle that
I hope I will find serenity and agility!
That is just a perfect story - I love thinking about putting order into something that you can. And the simple pleasures of an afternoon.
The sky picture is amazing!!
And I know this feeling very well ... how a little work in the garden helps to calm down and bring back some order. :-)
Having just finished a day's work in the garden, I know just how Jonathan feels. I don't have hammock, but my couch is calling me!
Why spoil a good day with a bad book--I have so been there. When the weather's perfect, even a good book can't lure me. Loved your photo and your hymn to the joys of gardening, which I'm sure you've heard me say many times, is what along with my poetry, keeps me sane. Commiserations on the blogger difficulty. I've had several comments sent to the abyss lately. V. frustrating.
You nailed gardening, Talon and the photos are wonderful. I love the light on the bird's feathers and the soft shadows on the clouds.
Mmm, that sounds absolutely magnificent and akin to what my weekend looked like over the long weekend. I love to putter in the garden. While I didn't have anyone to bring me big fat sandwiches and a nice pale ale, I did have a handful of young men breaking their backs spreading mulch in my yard. My role was to keep ahead of them weeding, thinning, and pulling out plants to divide. Keeps me in the here and now, and happy!
Same here, have been able to leave comments sporadically.
Great little story. I like to think of our little hippie life like this story.
Lucky are those who can turn a tedious chore into a peaceful, enjoyable activity. That was a nice lunch, too.
There really are lessons to be learned in the microcosm of the garden. I would love to spend a leisurely afternoon in the comfort of a hammock gazing at the clouds. Beautiful writing.
I love this peice of writing Talon.. and your photos as always are wonderful. The feathers on that bird!
ahh the pleasures of simplicity :)
enjoyed reading :)
What a great photo of order and chaos the cloud photograph is.
We're all so spoiled with your responses too! Sorry it's acting up like that for you-
That's why I write in notepad or copy my text before hitting publish- I find the longer my answers are the more often it gets eaten!
Good luck!
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