Dirt

My mom says I used to eat dirt. I know my cousin and my brother both used to. They would take a spoon to a corner of our grandmother’s house and dig at the adobe bricks. 

Yes. Adobe. As in bricks made from mud and straw and then sun baked. 

If you wanted to see my grandmother annoyed, definitely smiling at her with dirt on your teeth would do it. 

But never me. Nope. 

I liked the feel of cold dirt between my toes or with my hands making fists in mud. Until I didn’t. Then I was either running for the water hose or the bathroom sink. If you wanted to see my mom annoyed, just track mud inside on her newly mopped floors. I was usually the culprit because mud pies were my specialty. And somehow the mud would get everywhere. Including mom’s floors. 

There’s few things that will take me back to being a kid like digging in dirt. The feel of it. The look of it. The wonderful, rich loamy smell of it. Maybe it’s why I enjoy gardening. 

So why dirt?

Because sometimes I have days that are hard and it’s good to ground myself again.  To grab onto something familiar and just not think. No illness. No cancer. No anger. Just me and dirt. 

Yesterday was one of those days. It began the night before with cross words between Doug and I.  It turned into a day of tears and swollen eyes. Of headaches and sore throat. And unfortunately, it ended in a night of tossing and turning. 

And so on those mornings, I pull a chair up to my potting bench and I start digging. I don’t think. I don’t contemplate. My attention is totally on what my hands are doing. And little by little, tension leaves my shoulders and my body relaxes as I dig a bit. 

This past year has been tough. I know it has been for many. And tensions are tight. Stress is high. If I have another zoom meeting I might scream! And right now, I’m waiting before I can be tested for Covid again. Hoping for a negative test this time. And the stress continues into the future. There’s already appointments throughout the summer for other tests and procedures. 

In the midst of all this stress, Doug and I have taken a backyard that was wild and wooly and turned it into a retreat. I now have lots of places to dig and lots of pots to fill. I have dirt. But I also have beauty from that dirt. And if everything goes right, I’ll be making spicy salsa from some of the plants I’ve planted in my dirt. 

So dirt. I like it. 

There’s beauty that can come from it. It just takes time.