In the beans and squash

I can't believe this is what greets me when I open the front door. All the events of this past three years have brought me here. A property in the mountains somewhere in the Slocan Valley. Plums, wasps and the hot sun beating down my back have been companions these past few months, as I worked on getting this garden going.

I'm on welfare. I don't get much. I get even less when they find out Mitch's made a contribution. So in order to feed my daughter and myself, I planned to erect a garden with my room mate. Things were on track until money ran out. Then personal upheavals. As soon as fencing was done, gardening became a solo effort.

Then an obsession.

I worked from morning as the deers paraded, stared and lounged fifty feet away by the pond, 'till it was so dark I could no longer see. Turning compost, pushing wheelbarrows of rocks and dirt, shoveling for hours, being alone with my thoughts...At first I had music and podcasts running on a loop going but soon enough came to prefer the sounds that surrounded me. The buzzing of the hummingbirds, the bees and the flies. Woodpecker working on a nearby tree. Rustling in the bushes. My daughter screaming a song by my side.

 I became indistinguishable from one of those dirt covered hippies running around town with a baby on my hips, caked in dirt, towing straw and dirt in the back of my car. I got plants gifted to me. I got soil gifted to me when I could no longer afford it. I started sleeping with the window open. I started dreaming again. One morning I heard an owl and realized it had probably been the first time I'd heard one in the flesh. I am slowly feel myself embracing this environment. I stand outside and sometimes cannot contain a burst of elation, a spiral, throwing my arms in the hair I just twirl, I feel free. I feel free. I'm hooping faster and faster, my muscles stretching and aching wonderfully beneath my skin.

I might have been a nervous wreck when I arrived here and still am, to a certain degree. But I've seem to have found tranquility in this place and wow is it ever...the soothing feeling, a warm caress over the raw wound that has been my heart since I can remember. I feel, being in this place, like everything is possible. The soil seems to sing underneath my feet and trees shimmer in the hot sun. I feel alive. 

Wormwood's invaded most of the property we live on and tomorrow I will harvest some to dry in the ridiculously large kitchen I know call mine. I'm currently looking for a new room mate to move in on the first of September. I have no one as of now, but I'm praying it's someone who would help me liven this place up. It has potential. I see it as a potluck hang out, some lanterns out back, monthly full moon jam? I'm probably going to build a humble firepit out of rocks.

Someone I can share a space with. Someone who's empathetic and likes to clean.

A healthy human being.

I'm tired but elated by the fact that for some reason my fingers are dancing across the keyboard again. Tomorrow is Market Day. I was fortunate to get some financial help from my mommy, so I have gas again! Which means groceries! Which means the lovely child and her slave of a mother will get to survive for another week or so.