Bleeding Hearts, Miniature Daffodils & Clematis, Oh My!

There's been a strange feeling in my person, on my body today... took me 'til just a moment ago to realize what it is. It's joy!!

Joy! Joy! Joy!

This year as I build The Garden Of Disorderly Conduct I will make good and sure to plant early bloomers like magnolia and crocus and squill. I love the early blooms that greet us after the gray-blue wonder of winter. They look how I feel this year, how I always hope to feel at the bottom of it all.

When the bleeding hearts started to poke up through the soil in their tight little red cones I actually squealed! They were the first out of bed this year and seemed to hold much of my grief and happiness from the winter that's now behind us. I think it's sweet that they're called 'bleeding hearts' and that they bloom and bloom and bloom. I love that I live in a 'garden level' apartment and can watch them as if I were a worm. I love that soon I will be kneeling in these beds almost every day from now until October. I love that I can see flowers and herbs growing in every window in this apartment.

I love that many of these plants are gifts from my mother. She engendered in me a love of gardening many years ago while I lived at home nursing a broken heart. She would ask me in one way or another to come out of my pitiful cold basement and help her please. My blood pressure and the sun are killin' me. Please help me plant this pear tree. Please help me put the snapdragons around the pond... She coaxed me and put me to work in the dirt and put me to the work of the Living Green. I am amazed and amazed by this gift time and time again. My mom's good like that:)

I love this best: from now until the frost returns one of my favorite places on earth is totally open to me, for me to be me in and be love and dig and play and rest and work.

Welcome Spring!!! May you all have many good feelings on your bodies too:))