The Gardener who writes

My favorite pasttime lately is to keep the TV in the OFF position, sit at the computer and ramble around looking at and reading people's blogs. I am so enthralled with what makes others excited, bored, angry, interesting. And there are some interesting people around , let me tell you!

I found one Blog called Orangette and it is all about cooking and is beautifully presented, very artistic. I found Bill of the Birds (thanks Jan) and he is so birdly-wise it truly amazes me! And what a following that guy has! He didn't write for a day and began his blog apologizing to his audience! Imagine if I had a following that even noticed I didn't write in my blog!?!

Today I followed links from one guy who writes alot about LOST(the cultic TV show I watch weekly...)and discovered some theologically thought provoking sights I will return to. He is found at www.provokingconversation.wordpress.com and has become one I check periodically...His links led me to a poetry loving sight which led me to a poem-which is what I wanted to share here. Frankly, it's content is for a daughter or two of mine I believe would enjoy reading it, but why confine this gentleman's work to a mere email when the world is at our fingertips?

Here it is:
Stanley Kunitz died in 2006 when he was 100 years old.He was apparently an avid gardener and writer as well.I think this is part of a larger poem, but I am not sure-

Touch Me, from Collected Poems

Outdoors all afternoon
under a gunmetal sky
staking my garden down,
I kneeled to the crickets trilling
underfoot as if about
to burst from their crusty shells;
and like a child again
marveled to hear so clear
and brave a music pour
from such a small machine.
What makes the engine go?
Desire, desire, desire.
The longing for the dance
stirs in the buried life.
One season only,
and it’s done.

So let the battered old willow
thrash against the windowpanes
and the house timbers creak.
Darling, do you remember
the man you married? Touch me,
remind me who I am.

Wasn't that grand? I sigh after reading it, waiting for the full impact to penetrate my being. There are men who are such romantics and so full of words that pour out from somehwere within them. I hope someday to meet such a man, a gentleman perhaps, tending his garden.

Blogs Beat Emails

I think the reason I prefer Blogs to Emails these days is the low expectation of a response.

On my email accounts{oh, and how frustrating to have 2 and still not receive messages!!} I usually assume that if I correspond with someone, for whatever reason(even a silly survey)I need to hear back from them! This is a need, based on a desire to actually communicate and find out how they are, what they have been up to, how they feel, etc. A general "care about you " attitude on my part.
My preference with people has always been to KNOW them and KNOW them well, a rare condition it appears, sometimes referred to as friend.

Now I am as guilty as the next person of ignoring an email from time to time, thinking I will get back to them after work, later in the day, when I am in a better mood[this is often the reason, btw], or secretly hoping they will forget I didn't answer and write me again. This is called Lazy. Yes, even a grandmother of 10 , mother of many, birdwatcher, cat tolerator, and Perfect parent[remember? I have a dog named Perfect??!!] can be Lazy. Hard to imagine, yet so true.

Anyhow, where was I? Oh, ignoring. On Blogs, you have no expectation of a response, thus, no ignoring! You just write, because you want to express something from within. I think it is an underrated system of communicating and I personally am going to change it. I am not that important , mind you, I just know people. Lots of people.

Blogs can be written, then forgotten. Or should someone happen to comment on your blog(thanks to timmers here) you can feel momentarily cared about, validated, affirmed. Should nobody comment, you do not have to know that nobody READ your blog, you can just be pro-active and go read somebody else!!

Now here is the beauty of Blogging. You can snoop into other people's minds and lives and never have a relationship with them!! No need to email! No need to wait for a hint of how they are! No need to care about them personally-just visit temporarily their exciting (or boring I just discovered this morning) lives and be gone. Away with you to your life filled with grandchildren and children and pets and friends!! Off you go to work or school or the grocery store with the biggest loss leaders! On with the TV and the LOST season opener...

Oh I love blogging, and am so sad that I am 5 years behind the times...think of all the wasted moments of feeling I was being ignored.So many emails written. Daughter in New Mexico informed me I was 5 years late on this 'rage' when I told her of my new blog.

Tsk, Tsk, better late then never. Excuse me now as I go read about the lost art of paper cutting....(don't they know why it should stay lost?)