by a Spirit of the Written Word writer

Used to navigating the world on my own, one step at a time, a single parent with no one in the passenger seat to help read the map, I feel my aloneness even more since my son has moved out of our nest. He moved 3000 miles away to the desert where he lives deep in palms, vines, heat and sand.

I woke up one day needing to fill that giant hole in my heart, the one he occupies day, noon, and night.

He is the one that can interrupt what I’m doing because he is unaware of perfect timing, my timing. He doesn’t wait for pauses in between sentences. But regardless of what I could be doing, he jumps in in between breaths when the moment moves him. So, with him across the country—which could just as easily be across the globe—without infrequent dashes of conversation and possible interruptions to my day, I must create a new narrative, a new vision, a start of a new life’s chapter.

So, on that day I woke up with a longing for more, I saw my friend’s Facebook page sharing a video of the new, showy, wildflower meadow on a patch of his large farm, swaying between the house, the clothesline and the red barn. I, being a total city girl, had the audacity to ask him in front of all his Facebook friends a very serious question. Did this magical garden just grow this way on its own? Or did it have help?

“Help,” he replied. We took our chat offline and he referred me to the magical world beyond most city girls’ experience: Eden Brothers Seed Company. While gazing at the beauty and richness on their website of joys the colorful pictures promised, I needed more information.

“Which mix of seeds did you purchase?” I asked.

He replied, “The Northeast Seed Blend.”

My friend explained all the steps necessary for planting for success. Remove all grass. Rake in seed. Stomp it down some. Plant when it’s too cold for it to germinate. Save some seed for spring in case. Wait. I added to this list—confirm with the guy who sometimes helps me. Yes, he has a rototiller. Yes, he is excited to help me with this project. He encouraged me to consider adding some spring bulbs to the order—we can plant those together too!

I promptly ordered a quarter pound of Northeast Wildflower seed—30 spring bulbs, organic lavender—just “because “—and a cool Blue Star Columbine, also “because.” Wait. Order ships when planting season comes near.

Not to be too eager, expecting, or arrogant—today in the rain my friend Jeff, a retired gardener, came over to offer his advice and thoughts on the current situation of my small yard.

Impressed by some already cool things in my yard—a Rhododendron Maximus. A Teddy Bear rhododendron. Something from the Himalayas… And I was equally impressed with his ability to name all my plants in English and in Latin. Whereas my plant classification, absent genus and species and taxonomy, was simpler. The fragrant pink bush that blooms in May is my “May bush.” The tree with peeling brown bark that I thought was a birch, I called “cinnamon bark tree.” Turns out, it is actually a maple. The green shaggy bushes out front I swore were spruce, are actually another form of arborvitae. And the afternoon continued in a friendly exchange of layperson garble (or maybe poetry?) and gardener genius. I was grateful to have been given permission for something out of the box, an idea that I could actually move three dinosaur size hostas that have been in the corner of the steps forever. I can replace them with sun loving colors of echinacea, phlox, and bee balm.

In these days, absent my son, and needing to redefine and re-craft my life, I am finding no one can explain how to love the world, but I can start here. Today, with myself, and a vision for a beautiful garden soon to be filled with an abundance of many new lives to tend, talk to, inhale, water, and love. These feel within my reach, a chapter in my new “Book of Delights.” And, I am not alone, with the expertise, kindness, encouragement and help of others.

The Writer is a breast cancer survivor and official senior citizen!