Climaxed: gardening

Friday, February 6, 2015

That Feeling You Get

So today is Secret Subject Swap--one of my favorite blog challenges. Here's how it works: For this week, 15 brave bloggers signed up and submitted a secret prompt. We were each given a prompt of our own about two weeks ago. Today, we simultaneously divulge our interpretations of the prompts we were given. No one knows who got what or what the other prompts are, so today's the big reveal, so to speak. I'll include links to all the other bloggers at the end so you can comb through and see how it goes. Happy reading!

My prompt is:

Do you believe in love at first sight?

It was submitted by: http://www.JuiceboxConfession.com

________________________________________________________________________

I believe in lust at first sight.

I also firmly believe that many an individual confuses lust for love which is the only thing that can really explain why so many people in my Facebook feed or even in life around me seem to fall in love on the first date and fall out of it just as quickly before moving on to the next love of their lives.

You can desire someone, lust for them, feel a yearning to know them on both an intimate and carnal level when you see them; I do believe that. It happens to me often when I see a chubby, tattooed, and bearded man. I shamelessly objectify, stare slack-jawed, and often do triple or quadruple takes depending on the beard in question, but that’s not love. Love is far too complicated and immeasurable to happen in an instant like that, to be based on looks and first impressions alone.

Love builds over time as you get to know a person and figure out who they are. The intimacy of the details shared with one another about your life journeys bond you. The other person’s quirks become endearing even if still annoying. There’s a passion in the knowing, and with romantic love, there’s a passion in exploring each other’s bodies as well as minds. Love is not something that snaps perfectly into place in the blink of an eye because it’s based on who that person is--the past, the present, personality, character flaws, hopes, dreams, passions, goals, idiosyncrasies, hobbies, and needs. Saying that love is so one dimensional that it can happen on sight alone really does a disservice to the state of truly loving someone, of sacrificing for them, worrying, caring, and being their champion in good times and bad.

Perhaps there are some mothers who contend they fell in love with their children on sight, but that’s not the truth of the matter either, not really. That’s certainly not the way it worked for me. I grew to love my child well before he made his first appearance in this world, and it didn’t happen the first time I saw his tiny form on an ultrasound screen either. All I really felt then was fear and a little awe. As I tracked his growth and what was happening to him, picked his name out, bought him little clothes, things began to change. With every kick I felt and every book I read to my growing belly, the stronger I felt. The love was there before I ever saw his tiny fingers and itsy bitsy toes. The bond built over time as my body sacrificed to nourish his. With every craving and maddeningly exhausting day, the love grew and continued to grow to astronomical proportions. His ruddy little cheeks and fawn crown of hair only added to it. He was perfect when he fell asleep on my chest the first time, but it wouldn’t have mattered if he had been born with any number of defects—I would have loved him all the same because that love was made before my eyes ever landed on his tiny, pink form.

No matter how you look at it, love takes time to grow. It’s like a garden that way. It needs care, time, and a little TLC. It needs to be nourished and given your attentions. And when you do all those things you might get lucky and get a good harvest…or you might do all the right things and still get half-formed ears of corn. Love is fickle that way. And that’s okay. It’s worth the work and the gamble. The good times are worth enduring the bug-ravaged squash vines that make you fall to your knees in the middle of the rows and cry out of frustration or toss your spade in the ditch out of anger. You might even scream to the skies that you’ll NEVER PLANT ANOTHER FUCKING GARDEN AGAIN, but you don’t mean it. It’s too blissful being surrounded by the scent of tomato plants popping a couple of still dirty cherry tomatoes in your mouth while you’re covered in sweat and smiling in the fading sunlight of the day.

So, I do believe you can get a tingle, something electric that makes you want to know a person on sight, but that’s not love, and that’s okay. Because love is worth the work. The bounty of the harvest you get when you get love right is worth the blood, sweat and tears. If it were any easier, it wouldn't feel half as good when you succeed.

That's my swap, folks. Here are the links to the other bloggers:

http://www.BakingInATornado.com Baking In A Tornado

http://stacysewsandschools.blogspot.com/ Stacy Sews and Schools

http://berghamchronicles.blogspot.com The Bergham’s Life Chronicles

http://spatulasonparade.blogspot.com Spatulas on Parade

http://dinoheromommy.com/ Dinosaur Superhero Mommy

http://themomisodes.com The Momisodes

http://climaxedtheblog.blogspot.com Climaxed

http://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/ Confessions of a part-time working mom

http://www.southernbellecharm.com Southern Belle Charm

http://thelieberfamily.com The Lieber Family

http://www.someoneelsesgenius.com Someone Else’s Genius

http://www.eviljoyspeaks.wordpress.com Evil Joy Speaks

http://www.gndisney.wordpress.com Disneyland in Kentucky

http://sparklyjenn.blogspot.com/ Sparkly Poetic Weirdo

http://www.JuiceboxConfession.com Juicebox Confession

Friday, April 4, 2014

Secret Subject Swap: April Edition

This is my second time participating in the Secret Subject Swap with Baking in a Tornado. This month 14 different bloggers decided to particpate. We each submit writing prompts that are then swapped and interpreted in our own individual styles then we post them all on the same day at the same time for everyone to enjoy.

My subject was submitted by Dino Hero Mommy.

"As spring approaches what are you impatiently waiting to do? Why?"

...soil caked under my nails and between my toes

...sweat on my brow and soaking through my shirt at the small of my back

...green fingers and broken nails from pulling weeds by hand

...the swaying of tiny seedlings in the summer breeze

...parfum de plant de tomate (tomato plant perfume)

...the first blooms followed by the first pods and fruits

...a pot of green beans on the stove grown from seed to maturity

...squash grilled to perfection

...every meal graced by my own work

Thinking of Spring (which is already arriving here in Climax) brings on images of gardening, and I have been impatiently waiting to get all that started as the throes of winter have clung harder than usual this year in the South. Growing up, I never would have pegged myself to be a gardener, but for 4 years now, it has been the best therapy. Standing between the rows covered in green stains and dirt letting the first ripened cherry tomato of the season burst in my mouth is better than any pill I could ever take.

Perhaps it’s the work involved, the focus on the tasks at hand that keep your mind free from everything else, or maybe it’s the actual enjoyment of the spoils of your labor that does it. Maybe it’s all of the above. No matter what does it, springtime is planting time. It’s time to get dirty, to work my hands into the soil turning it by hand, to water and weed, to love every moment in the sun surrounded by bees and earthy aromas with weeds and dirt clumps stuck in my hair.

Springtime means working for myself and enjoying the fruits of that work rather than working for someone else. Every moment spent laboring in the South Georgia humidity provides my little family with another black eyed pea, another tomato, another green bean or squash. Every moment sustains us, nourishes us. No one reaps the bounty of my work but me and it feels phenomenal. I’m not getting paid by the hour to turn earth and pull weeds just to give the harvest over to a boss or an owner or a CEO or another asshat investor while I barely bring home a handful of beans for myself. It is all mine unless I choose to give it. There are no words to describe the deliciousness that brings to my life.

As Chuck Palahniuk eloquently wrote in Fight Club, “ I see all this potential, and I see it squandered. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables – slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars, but we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off.”

The work I put into my land changes that. It gives me purpose and a desire to be able to truly take care of myself without reliance on a job I hate and shit I don’t really need.

Springtime is revolution time.

Here is the rest of the linkups for this month: