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It’s February and most of us have already broken our new year’s resolutions. This year one of mine is to contribute to this blog, although I wonder who on earth will read my mundane musings. One of my other resolutions is to keep my own garden weeded.
Weeding my garden has become the bane of my existence ever since my well-intentioned husband, who often creates work for himself as a hobby, scooped up a front-end loader full of “that real good mulch and manure from around the hay ring” and dumped it into my garden. That spring my garden burst forth with the most beautiful purple carpet of Spiny Pigweed you’ve ever seen. For years, I have busied myself removing this prolific version of Amaranth from my garden before the plant gets large enough to have the stickers that cause lots of pain and discomfort to my already gnarly hands. Besides, who ever heard of a county agent with a weedy garden?
The Pigweed in my garden is enemy number 1. In reflecting on this hate-hate relationship I have with this weed, it occurred to me that Pigweed could also be a metaphor for removing other useless things from my life. Clutter, gossip, worry, oh the list of Pigweeds we let creep into our “garden” or life is endless. These “Pigweeds”, like the real thing, are easiest to remove before they take root and get those great big stickers that make us avoid the weeding task. So I challenge you to join me in keeping our gardens weeded!
Melissa Beck, her husband Paul, and their three children are fully immersed in the rural life of South Arkansas. And a busy life it is. In Melissa's words, "meet me at the barn ... there's work to be done."
