An Inside Job

Winter is not over yet, it’s still too cold to go out and play in the dirt, I say to myself, and so what if I don’t have a greenhouse to go putz around in, and so, there is little greenery outside. I am not about to let Old Man Winter or anything else get me down, I’m going to make happiness an inside job!

So, what did I do yesterday? I pulled out my garden books, and thought about what to put in pots sitting empty with no houseplants in them. One of the pots in particular brought cheer when I came across it in a box of stuff that had been in storage for fifteen years  – a terra-cotta garden pot my mother had painted and sent to me back in 2001. I became focused on looking for a picture of just the right indoor plant to fill mom’s pot with.

My mom is on my mind.  She went to be in the heavenly garden on this day in March five years ago. So, once I have a plant or flower in the pot, it will be placed again right where it is pictured for a very special reason. I can see it easily. My mom was a “ginger” all her life – and the painting of the girl on the cover of Nancy Guzik‘s art book has a likeness to my mother as a young girl.

Yesterday was bright despite the winter starkness all around. Again today, I’ll play the music which entices my little budgerigar to chirp louder and more frequently than she usually does. Her cheeps and tweets transports my mind into a beautiful conservatory filled with plants and birds, and again I’ll  drink tea and leaf through beautiful garden images.  Happy as a lark, I can be in this “wintering thing.”  If I didn’t like being outdoors in the fresh air so much, I could get much too used to it. But yes, happiness is truly an inside job, isn’t it? It is up to us to create our own.