Addendum And Time Shifts

Mr. Moon and I have worked outside all day long, he on the irrigation, me on picking up old downed branches and hauling them to the burn pile and trimming the Confederate jasmine. It's the sort of Sunday I really enjoy. It's not unlike picking up your house before you really begin to clean. I will get inside the garden tomorrow. I'm pretty sure about that. It's funny. I go about my gardening by a sort of internal clock. All of a sudden, I know it is time to get on my knees and and plant my seeds. And then there is little that can stop me.

And speaking of clocks- well- what do I need to say? According to the clock, it is 5:18 pm but of course I keep translating- well, it's really only 4:18, and so forth but frankly, I will be glad to go to sleep when the clock says 10:30, even if it is "really" only 9:30. I am exhausted already and have more to do before bed. Plenty more.

But I know this for sure- my chickens, instead of going to roost at 6:30, will head to the chicken coop at 7:30. They are not fooled, those wise birds of mine! The clock does not dominate their lives nor proscribe their actions. And it has been a lot of fun to watch their actions today as they've hunted and pecked and made dirt baths and rested in the shade and sunned themselves, too. I think Elvis got a little bit of sexy time with Miss Carol and that is sort of amazing- it's not like he doesn't have nine hens of his own. But, there you go, a rooster is a rooster.

But anyway, I went into the garden to tell Mr. Moon that I was DONE. DONE and EXHAUSTED from my labors and that I was going to try and tidy up the front porch and then that was that! Except of course to make supper and get the clothes off the line and put them away and wash the dishes and make his lunch for tomorrow and oh well, we all know about the third shift, don't we?

He was exhausted too, that man, and we both stretched out on the warm dirt of the garden and we gazed at the sky and sighed deep sighs of comfort, laying there in our overalls. I reached over for him and he took my hand. It was, well, it was what I was writing about this morning.

Isn't that what we want? Someone to hold our hand when we are tired and happy, laying on our backs and looking at the sky above us?
I don't know about you, but that's what I want.

And of course, because he's a man, he had to get up and pretend to get sexy with me, lying there on my back like a turtle. I giggled and said, "Are you going to put a bed in here?" He considered it. I suggested that a hammock would be nice. Of course it would be now but it no one would want to lie in a hammock in the garden in late June, much less August.
But still, it was a nice moment, considering that and the implications.

He laughed and said, "Can you turn the water on by the pump for me when you go in?"
I allowed as how I could but first I had to get up. "That would be my first problem," I said.
He grabbed my hands and sort of tugged-flung me upright so fast that I felt as if I had been hurtled into a new dimension, which made me laugh. I told him that and he said, "I'm a bit dizzy myself."

And isn't that a relationship? One minute you're in this world, and the next you're in that, the two of you dizzy and laughing.

I think I'll take him a beer. It's "really" only 4:30 but actually, it's 5:30. Or something. Whatever. We've worked hard today. It's been a good day. The clock says one thing, the chickens say another, agreeing with the sun. I say, whatever, and decide that like love, this random time shifting is mysterious and out of my control.

And that's okay with me. Right now, it's just fine.

We all have our internal clocks, we all have the external ones too. The lucky of us have love and chickens and warm black dirt and cube steak (very expensive cube steak!) marinating in milk.

That would be me.
And I would wish the same for you.