I used to judge people who refer to gardening or yard work as “exercise.” Not consciously. I just grouped them together with the people who park far away from the door when they go shopping and call that their exercise for the day. (Not that it’s a bad idea. It’s a terrific idea. But if that’s your entire exercise regimen, you’re not gonna get very far.)
But, man. Now I have a yard. And now I know, yard work is hard work. I can’t even do it intensively for long, because I have to keep track of a toddler, so I still can’t imagine what it must be like to do it for hours at a time. Today I finally got around to taking care of the jungle of weeds and bushes that had entangled themselves together under a decorative garden tree until I had no idea what belonged and what didn’t and I’ve been wanting to get rid of the whole mess since we’ve moved in. Today was the day. Those bushes/weeds/etc. are gone.
The pine needles in about 1/4 of the yard are still raked into various piles that need to be moved to the curb. I still need to rake the rest, clip back some of the garden bushes I know I want to keep, and pick up a few more of the branches that last week’s storm knocked down from our trees.
I’m still sore from what I’ve managed to do, and I’ve yet to actually exercise today.
I wonder what other unconscious prejudices I have that this little thing called “life” will manage to knock out of me.
Free Is a Lark 