Cleaning out the greenhouse

Last fall, struggling with that low-grade covid fatigue that many of us carry, I never bothered to clean up our little greenhouse. That made it rather challenging to start seedlings last month without tripping over pots and tracking dirt around. 

Now that all my babies are thriving and it's warm enough to move them outside for short periods, I cleaned up and took a picture of the plantlings set out on our cold frame. They look so happy, and I'm excited about the coming gardening season.

So far, I've got 76 tomatoes of different varieties, a dozen pepper plants (four kinds), four trays of different onions, petunias, geraniums, marigolds, amaryllises, dahlias, calla or canna lilies (or maybe both?) and herbs.

In a month's time, everything will be lanky and more than ready to be planted in garden beds and boxes, but for now, I'm just enjoying these stocky little ones. Life is tenacious, and worth celebrating after a long winter!

It doesn't take much to make me happy

A friend of mine is pretty wonderful about finding opportunities to recycle things (actually, I have a whole group of friends in that category, and they are known as Master Composter/Recyclers). Said friend saw an opportunity in the straw bales the City uses at tobogganing hills to prevent tobogganers from crashing into trees and crossing into each others' paths. So he had the City gather and leave a bin of bales in a City park for anyone who might want them -- namely, gardeners like me.

I told Lee about the bales being available, and he was raring to go find them -- threw a sheet of plastic in the back of our Hyundai, and off we went. Unfortunately, we ended up at the wrong park, but the City employees we talked to there told us that if we could find any leftover bales on any tobogganing hills, we could take them.

So that's exactly what we did -- we live close to the Edmonton Ski Club which is right next to Gallagher hill, a famous tobogganing area in our neck of the woods (Rick Mercer rode a concrete toboggan down it once, video below). We drove over to a power pole surrounded by bales, threw three into the back of our vehicle, and went home happy. I was triply happy because 1) I have always wanted to get my hands on some straw for under my strawberry plants 2) I'm glad to make use of something that was only going to the City composter, and 3) it was fun to "steal" bales and look like crazies to the people on the hill at the time. As we drove away, we joked about them taking our license plate numbers and calling the police.

Today's task? Spreading those three happy-making bales around my garden. And if I don't have enough straw, there might still be a few bales left at Gallagher Hill for me to collect.

For those of you who have never seen a concrete toboggan, here's the Rick Mercer video from 5 years ago... fun and games!

Simple Suggestion #240... Smile!

Are you a smiler? I am. And according to Ron Gutman's Ted talk, it helps me get through life more easily. Happy Friday... Enjoy!

Simple Suggestion #229... Count your steps

For about the past year, I've added one small thing to my daily wardrobe -- a pedometer that hooks to my belt. It tells me, every evening, how far I've walked during the day, and encourages me to get more exercise.

You'd think that having a dog might be enough encouragement, but being a lapdog, Shadow is happy to lounge around for much of the day, and I could just as easily get exercise without him. But I know that walking is good for us both, and Health Canada recommends that Canadians make an effort to walk at least 10,000 steps a day.

For me, that usually translates into at least a half hour of concerted effort, going outside, breathing fresh air, and striding briskly. On days when my pedometer reads less than my 10,000 steps, I don't feel quite as good, somehow. Maybe I'm lacking the endorphins provided by that extra exercise? Shadow seems a bit more lethargic, too, when we miss a walk, but then, in the evenings, he has too much puppy energy and tears around the house out of boredom!

Walking is probably the best exercise there is. It doesn't require any memberships or special equipment, you don't have to drive to a facility to participate, and you can do it indoors or outdoors, depending on the season. Best of all, your steps matter -- all day long. If you go outside, you can have a little nature fix, too, listening to the birds or checking out the scenery -- and things are always changing, have you noticed? Today, the tulips in some yards are a little taller than yesterday. The house that's being rebuilt around the corner has some windows installed since I last walked that way. I like making walking into an opportunity to notice and appreciate things in my world.

But if that's not where you're at, and you like the idea of more motivational, competitive options, there are walking websites that feature challenges to encourage participation, usually connected to different pedometers, which aren't that expensive. Mine cost me nothing, thanks to a library share program I participated in -- and when I returned the pedometer kit after the three week loan period, the program, called UWalk, sent me a free pedometer to encourage my further participation.

For Christmas, I bought three more pedometers (at about $15 ea) for my daughters, and we all joined the UWalk website (https://uwalk.ca) for a "walk Alberta" challenge, our cumulative steps taking us from Coutts, in the very south of our province, all the way to Hay River, North West Territories. Wouldn't have made it in our 100 day deadline without the help of my sisters. Right now, some of us are tracking our steps for the distance to Radium Hotsprings, BC, one of our favourite summer vacation places.

Most pedometers these days have some sort of tracking website or way to log steps in order to encourage a pedometer "habit." My little "accessory" motivates me to walk further than I would otherwise -- I'll admit there have been a few evenings when I probably would have settled into couch potato mode, but when I saw that I had only 8500 steps, Shadow and I took Lee with us for another little walk, which Lee also appreciated. It's also fun, on busy days working in the garden, to be surprised when my pedometer reads over 20,000 steps. That means I walked 16 km just in my own yard! Sometimes, the number of steps spent cleaning the house surprises me, too!

There are all sorts of ways to keep tabs on our exercise levels and encourage a healthier and less sedentary lifestyle, but counting steps is one of the easiest for me. How do you motivate yourself toward fitness?

Simple Suggestion #195... Enjoy the day's diamonds

Can you see the sparkles?

Shadow-dog and I are just back from a frosty walk, and it's a gorgeous day out there. Not temperature-wise if you're used to tropical climes, but beauty-wise. Yesterday we had a gentle snowfall that covered everything in diamonds of the best kind. They don't have to be mined or cut -- they just appear out of nowhere and make life glitter for a time without costing the earth a cent.

Life is full of diamonds -- ever notice? A friend of mine started this moodling in my mind by commenting on the Aurora Borealis (the prettier name for the Northern Lights) that were out early this morning when she was walking her dog. An Olympic gold for the Canadian women's curling team was another sparkling start to the day, and the story of a student basketball team manager with Down Syndrome given an honorary 2-day contract with the Philadelphia 76ers was another little diamond I found online. (Click here to see it.)

The walk Shadow and I took on a very pretty winter day is a diamond in itself, as were
the flocks of waxwings swirling in the skies above us. When we got home, the sight of the snow blocks cut out of my garden during my youngest daughter's fort making plans (that didn't quite reach fruition) made me smile. They look so pretty in the sun. The dog has a great time romping around them.

And said dog is another crazy little diamond that I managed to catch on camera, splashing through the snow diamonds and chasing his tail (I love how he always growls at it as he circles). In case you haven't guessed, anything that makes a person happy and makes life shine a little more than usual qualifies as a diamond in my books.

Where are your day's diamonds? Being aware of them is just one way to have a diamond of a day!

Looking for more Simple Suggestions? Click here.

What a guy!

We've been living in this house for nine years now, and though a wall had been knocked out between kitchen and dining room and new windows were installed, the kitchen had never been properly repainted, though the dining room had. The kitchen ceiling was so discoloured, and the walls weren't much better. As we hadn't done any home maintenance for almost a year, I happened to make a comment to Lee about how nice it would be to give the kitchen a fresh coat of paint the next time we were in reno mode.

I honestly didn't expect him to act on it. He had a pretty exhausting summer thanks to a trip overseas, and his vacation time came in short chunks rather than the nice two-week stretch it seems to take him to fully relax. There was always yard work or some minor project that prevented him from really taking a break, and I didn't mean to add to that with my kitchen comment.

I didn't realize it, but Lee was in a painting kind of mood. He repainted the cast iron railings at our front step because I'd been talking about doing that for a while, and then he took me to Rona to pick out paint for the kitchen.

Lemon Tart yellow was my choice -- for me, happiness is a yellow kitchen. I debated a bit about Lemon Tart or Cool Lemonade, and thought about how my kids complained about the lack of colour in our home (we like light, so we prefer white walls, especially in the winter). They wanted something bold. Lemon Tart was definitely bold in my books, so I went with that. The lady who mixed the paint gave me two thumbs up for my choice. So did our girls.

It took a week from buying to applying the last coat on Friday evening when Lee got home from work. The girls were ecstatic... but I wasn't so sure. It was SO bright. Hard on the eyes, almost. Definitely tart. Especially with our new ceiling light fixture. After we cleaned up, Lee and I took a walk to my parents' house for a visit with my dad (who had just had a cornea transplant and sees fine now!) and as we chatted, I mentioned my misgivings. My mom turned to Lee and said, "Do you think it's too bright?"

"I have no opinion on the matter," he said, to both my delight and exasperation. He was content to leave the decision to me, but at the same time, no help at all! When we got home, I pulled down a bit of the green tape to see how Lemon Tart looked against our white, and said I'd have to sleep on it.

I woke at seven, early for me on a Saturday morning, and went to look at the kitchen. Lemon Tart was definitely harsher than I expected it to be at that early hour. I tried to like it, I really did, but I also realized that the person who spends the most time in the kitchen had better be sure she likes it, especially since we don't paint that frequently. Could I live with Lemon Tart yellow for the next ten years? No. But how would I break it to Lee, who was looking forward to a Saturday with nothing pressing?

He appeared ten minutes later, took one look at my face and said, "We could mix the leftover ceiling paint with your Lemon Tart, and that might do it. What do you think?"

So that's what we ended up doing. Our girls complained as Lemon Tart was covered with something lighter, but as I pointed out to them, they can paint their own kitchens their own colours someday. One coat was all it took, and I was a much happier camper. My kitchen is a warm, buttery yellow now, and looks pretty sharp. Lee also sanded and repainted the stove top ceiling vent so that it looks brand new. He's pretty proud of that piece of work, and rightly so.

Best part of all? When everything was finished, I asked Lee what he thought of our kitchen. "I have no opinion on the matter," he said. "But I think you made the right choice."

What a guy! And I say that with absolute affection!

Happiness is...

... the fragrance of sweet peas.

Simple Suggestion #114... Sing a song

I'm still really enjoying Edward Hays' Chasing Joy: Musings on Life in a Bittersweet World (Ave Maria Press 2007, ISBN 13: 978-0-939516-78-0). Today I had to go back a few chapters to reread the ones about singing, just because they made me feel happy when I read them the first time.

Fr. Edward writes about how music is one of the best motivators for living a good and generous life, and I wholeheartedly agree with that. So often it's only taken the simple power of a good piece of music (the He's a Pirate Theme from the Pirates of the Caribbean really gives me a rush!) or a lively song like Phil Collins' You Can't Hurry Love to lift my spirits... and I can recall many times when work that seemed like drudgery somehow became more pleasurable because one bored person in the group decided to sing. It happens in our kitchen as our girls do the dishes sometimes. We also have videos of summer holidays where we were rowing a long stretch down a windy mountain lake and someone started singing 99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall. Before we knew it, there were several additional harmonies and side versions and we had reached the far shore... in much better spirits than before we sang.

In ages past, people sang all the time. Soldiers sang as they marched... do they still? People in the civil rights movement sang to encourage one another in their rallies against injustice, and labourers sang as they worked. One of my favourite saints, Vincent de Paul, who had been sold into slavery (because a ship he was on had been captured by pirates), sang until the lady of the plantation noticed him in the fields and made him her "house servant" instead... a considerably cushier job. He eventually won his freedom.

Unfortunately, in our world of music videos, cable radio and iTunes, a lot of us have forgotten about the joy of singing, alone or in a group. We've become passive listeners a lot of the time because it's Adele who has the pipes, not us. But by denigrating our own talents, great or small, we're doing ourselves a huge disservice. I'm not saying that we should all leave our homes in the morning as though we were the stars of our own version of Hairspray or any other hit musical you care to name. I'm just suggesting that adding a little more homemade music to our lives can't be a bad thing. It costs us and the planet nothing if we sing a few songs to lift our spirits. Few things make me happier than seeing someone singing in the car on their way to work. It's almost as good as listening to a little child un-self-consciously inventing her own words to a pop song!

Fr. Hays also reminds me that singing has healing power. He mentions how Alzheimer patients respond well when their caregivers sing... perhaps because the subconscious feels that if someone is singing, everything is alright somehow. And I suspect he's right when he says that "a song a day keeps the blues away."

So here's another one of my favourite tunes, from my favourite Coen Brothers movie, O Brother Where Art Thou. It's been stuck in my soul lately, so I've been singing aloud even though I don't have Allison Krauss' sweet voice. Why fight ear-worm music, I figure -- I might as well sing it until another piece comes along and takes its place. This one makes me happy in ways that I can't explain... maybe because it brings back memories of the first time I saw and heard it in the movie theatre, and felt like I was standing in the forest with the hilarious Soggy Bottom Boys, surrounded by the choir -- goosebumps time. A good, singable piece. Your secret mission today is to sing it aloud, or choose one you prefer, and see if it doesn't raise your spirits, and maybe even the spirits of those around you!

P.S. Happy Birthday, Cathy! Thanks for the many times we have walked and sung together, whether people were listening or not! "When I first came to this land..."

P.S. Again: Looking for more Simple Suggestions? Try here.

Contentment

Okay, so ambitionlessness isn't a word. But contentment definitely is. After reading the comments on my last post, I was reminded of this story. There are several versions of it on Youtube, but this is my favourite, just because I like the music, and the narrator doesn't have an annoying voice.

I suppose we all define success in different ways... but I get the feeling that too many of us let the lifestyles of the Rich and Famous dictate to us what success looks like. And that false ideal makes us unhappy because we'll never look like those celebrities on the Golden Globe catwalk. We won't have their fabulous possessions and piles of money. We won't receive the applause and adulation that they do... 

But really, who is happier? The folks who run from the papparazzi, or the ones who read their magazines? The mom who kisses her kids goodnight, or the actor on a film set in Paris, far away from family? My husband with his reliable commuter car, or the sports celebrity with so many vehicles that he can't count them all? The musician who sings on a different stage every night, or the teenager bopping down the street, sharing her iPod earbuds with her best friend? I guess it all depends on how you define happiness and success.

For a while there, after I started my moodlings, I thought it would be great if I could have a huge crowd of followers from all over the world to indicate that I was a successful blogger. I read accounts of how other people became famous in the blogworld, and I looked at popular blogsites to see if I could pick up any tricks or tips. There were plenty of people offering all sorts of advice about everything to do with increasing readership... most of which suggested following other people's blogs and commenting on them, so that they would look up my moodlings and comment in return, all of which seemed silly and meant spending way more time in front of my computer. 

Which is the last thing I want to do, because it's totally counter to living simply and happily according to my definition, and the fisherman's definition. Why catch more fish than you can eat and share with your neighbours? Why try to attract readers I don't know, when the ones I do know visit me now and then?

I wrote most of this moodling yesterday... then this morning, Henri Nouwen's daily reflection arrives in my inbox, another one of those God-incidences:

Often we want to be somewhere other than where we are, or even to be someone other than who we are. We tend to compare ourselves constantly with others and wonder why we are not as rich, as intelligent, as simple, as generous, or as saintly as they are. Such comparisons make us feel guilty, ashamed, or jealous. It is very important to realize that our vocation is hidden in where we are and who we are. We are unique human beings, each with a call to realize in life what nobody else can, and to realize it in the concrete context of the here and now.

We will never find our vocations by trying to figure out whether we are better or worse than others. We are good enough to do what we are called to do. Be yourself!

Just being myself and living in contentment is very freeing. I think I'll go and read some more Don Quixote now. It's actually quite entertaining.

Holiday happiness is...

...sleeping in.
...singing my favourite psalm, in harmony with my daughter, at church on Christmas eve.
...giggling at "Telestrations" at 1 a.m. Dracula's teeth couldn't have been drawn any longer, I don't think!
...sleeping in again.
...watching White Christmas and/or reading books with family on a quiet Christmas afternoon.
...Christmas dinner (and that yummy jello confection I told you about a while back)!

...taking a long drive to see our far away family in Southern Alberta.
...having good conversations, catching up on the news, and watching The King's Speech and My Big Fat Greek Wedding with them.
...sleeping in yet again.
...driving out to Dad's land to pick up one seriously heavy memento that is now waiting at our back door, to be situated in our garden in the spring (solid white granite).

...finding a pair of new pajamas at a boxing week sale.
...reading Anne Patchett's lovely and heartbreaking book, Bel Canto, a Christmas present from my dearest friend.
...watching my girls out in the playground, playing.
...listening to Cold Play and Christmas carols as we drive home.
...enjoying a cup of coffee -- in a new Sam Uhlick mug! -- with a bit of Mary Anne's homemade Baileys, and doing a HUMUNGOUS crossword puzzle.

I hope you're enjoying your Christmas week, too! Here's a little something just for your enjoyment, that my sister sent my way. Amazing!

#5 of 100 Simple Suggestions... Walk instead of driving

I think I've more than covered this idea in a few past moodlings... but I'll repeat myself a little for the sake of #5:

When I walk, my cheeks go pink, my hair gets wind-mussed, and I feel damp until light perspiration evaporates. I also take unbusy streets, avoiding the local five-legged spider of a traffic circle where cars crawl and blood pressure rises. At the moment, that circle is even slower than usual because of our fifth, most-detested and longest season... that of Construction.

When I walk, I enjoy the gifts of the seasons: light in the sky, birdsong, the smell of tree blossoms, the sight of flowering yards, the sound of fall leaves, or the feel of snowflakes against my cheeks. I appreciate the colours of growing things, or imagine the secret sleeping mounds of plants hidden under the snow.

When I walk, my lungs fill with fresh air and my heart thumps rhythmically and my doctor has no reason to insist upon cholesterol medication before my time. I feel strong, vital and less stressed than when I'm cooped in a car, breathing fumes. When I walk, I think deeply, or I sing to myself, or I pray, which are all much better uses of time than keeping my eyes on the road or waiting at red lights.

When I walk, the world stays cleaner, the climate cooler, and my heart happier because I know I am doing as little harm as possible to Earth, our beautiful home.

In the above paragraphs, I count almost 30 good reasons to leave my car at home. How about you?

P.S. Looking for more Simple Suggestions? See here.

A dozen reasons to have a garden

My tomato plants are an endless source of happiness to me as I'm waiting for my favourite time of year, which is called Gardening Season. True, it takes time and energy to bring tomatoes from seedling to harvest, but it's a process that makes me happy to the bone. Nothing tastes as good as a tomato I've grown myself. Or a carrot. Or a potato. You get the idea.

Now that the snow is melting in a serious way, I'm having garden dreams, and thinking and planning what our almost 900 square foot garden will hold this summer. And I'm thinking about all the reasons that everyone should have a patch of dirt for themselves:

1. Fresh air and exercise are good for the body.

2. Watching things grow is good for the soul.

3. Being involved in nature's life cycles is good for the psyche.

4. Digging your own dirt means that huge machines aren't spending enormous amounts of fossil fuels tilling the soil.

5. Planting your own seeds means other huge machines aren't adding tons of carbon to the atmosphere.

6. Pulling your own weeds, while a mindless task, is good for stress reduction.

7. Adding compost from your own compost pile (every gardener needs one!) fertilizes plants without extracting chemicals from the earth.

8. You control the chemicals that you might employ to get rid of bugs or weeds, but if you're like me, you see bugs and weeds as an important and necessary part of our ecosystem, and do your best to live with them.

9. Harvesting your own vegetables means more huge machines aren't polluting the air we breathe.

10. Making a salad (or anything else) from your own back yard means your food hasn't been sprayed with preservatives or picked before it's ripe.

11. It's handy not to have to run to the grocery store.

12. Things grown in the back yard also save your wallet and the environment a lot of shipping and transportation costs.

13. Sharing the bounty with friends and neighbours feels great, but good luck getting rid of zucchini!

Okay, so it's a Baker's dozen, but they're all good reasons. Of course, not everyone has the privilege of tending a garden, so the next best thing is to buy food at a farmer's market where you can meet and chat with the people who grow real food, instead of purchasing what Michael Pollan called "food-like substances" that have been processed beyond recognition.

Sometimes, I daydream about what it would be like if everyone on the planet was able to be involved in growing their own food. I've never met a miserable gardener, so I suspect the world would be a much simpler, happier, healthier, better place.

The first will be last and the last will be first

Recently, my two youngest daughters developed a little game on their way to school in the morning. It's called, "Who can leave the house first?" Almost inevitably, the youngest is the last one out the door because she's just not as organized as everyone else. This morning, however, she got up a few minutes earlier than usual and was actually ready before her older sister, but older sister blocked the doorway as she was putting on her shoes. I was called to the door to witness injustice: older sister leaning against the door, and younger one almost in tears because, hard as she had tried to be first, she wasn't going to win (again) without parental intervention.

What is it with human beings and competitiveness? Why do we feel that first place is the best place? When will we ever learn that for every winner, much more is lost?

Having been the eldest of three girls in my own family of origin, of course I am as guilty of playing the "first-last" game as anyone else. My parents had to intervene so that my sisters could win, too, and from that, I learned that losing can be better than winning, because first place can be a lonely place. I also had a few very competitive cousins my age, and from them I learned that deeper friendships form when competition has no place in them.

Oh, a little friendly competition can be a fun thing, but too often, it is carried to the extreme, and produces the negative results of broken communion. Those who always come first inevitably and unwittingly succeed in building walls around themselves and their success -- and end up envied and even disliked by those who didn't win. Those who lose aren't any better off. Their frustration and anger at being denied first place destroys communion for them, too, often leading to a sense of inferiority that no one wants to carry.

However, those who don't care about the game of first and last lose nothing. Their refusal to take competition seriously leaves them open to communion with everyone, first and last alike, because they have nothing to lose. This, however, goes against human nature as we know it!

Of course, these thoughts have applications to my pet topic, Voluntary Simplicity. People who choose to live simply refuse to play the game of winners and losers that consumer culture has laid out for them to play. They don't live by the adage of "who dies with the most toys, wins." Instead, they opt for using only as much as they need rather than being "first" in possessions, fashion, trendiness, and power. They try to live in communion with the earth and with those who will never "win" first place. I think they are the people Jesus is referring to when he says, "the last will be first," (Mk 10.31) or "the meek... will inherit the earth" (Mt 5.5) because for them, the happiness of everyone and everything in communion is more important than anything else.

When my daughters come home from school today, I plan to sit down with each of them and discuss their "first-out-the-door" game and its implications. Somehow, I doubt things will change much, but maybe I can convince them that their game isn't worth playing if they both want to leave the house happy in the mornings. Everyone's happiness, after all, is the true bottom line.

Ode to a clothesline

Oh lovely clothesline in the sun -- your praises do I sing --

drying clothes for everyone, sleeves and pants fluttering.

How humbly and simply you do your work, with only wind and sun

and the energy it takes to hang our garments one by one. 

So happy does it make me feel to see laundry flapping there,

to save earth's electricity, and to give our sheets fresh air.

My grandmother had a line like you that held twelve children's clothes,

but you will only ever hold a quarter as much, I suppose.

This busy, fast-paced world may never understand my pleasure

in hanging up each item as if it were a secret treasure,

but I feel connected to the breeze, the sun, and pins of wood.

I sense that using a clothesline is simple, organic, and, somehow, good.

I bury my nose in my fresh-dried clothes and my electric dryer I ponder.

Sans you, clothesline, would I enjoy today's wind and sun so much? I wonder.

(For more about clotheslines, see the video in the September moodling, Why I have chosen a life of Voluntary Simplicity. And for my friend who commented about it this week, here's the carrot/clothespin cross again! I'm not as lucky as my aunt's friend, whose carrot wore her lost wedding ring!)