More Thoughts, More Garden Stuff

Every summer the wisteria gives us a second bloom. It is nowhere near as abundant as the spring bloom is, but it's still lovely. I think the purple is more intense.

We've been getting a little rain off and on. It doesn't amount to much but it's better than nothing. Several times the sun has come out while the rain is still coming down and that is such an odd thing, isn't it? It's a little confusing but interesting. 

I hung my laundry up this morning (I like those shadows on the sheet) and then while I was eating my lunch, a little rain decided to fall and so I rushed outside to gather it in which was probably silly because if I'd simply left it out, everything probably would have re-dried before the next little cloudburst came through, which it did just a few minutes ago. But no, I brought it all in and stuck it in the dryer for a very short time and that was all it took. And everything got a little rain water blessing and we all know that's the best kind of blessing. 

I picked more beans today and I weeded some. It was hot work. Although the rain can cool things off, it can also turn to steam so that everything you do outside feels as if you are trying to work in a sauna which is not much fun. You can literally see steam rising from the streets after a rain on a very hot day. But I will say it's probably good for the skin. 

Hawk just landed in the yard again and then flew off. I suppose we are part of his scheduled daily routine. It does bring a tiny bit of different energy to my day. They have sort of a dangerous beauty although I no longer need to worry about one snatching something I love like I did when I had chickens. But once again, the songbirds have abandoned the feeder and are perched in the trees instead because a hawk can easily swoop down and catch one up at the feeder, but it's a lot harder to do in a leafy tree. 

I was thinking I might talk a little bit about how easy it is to get obsessive about weighing and giving those numbers so much power in our lives. I feel horrible about all of the women I weighed in when I was a Weight Watchers leader. It was usually an incredibly anxious moment for most members, to step up on the scale and see what the week's efforts had produced, or alternately, what the week's indulgences had produced. And it was so frustrating and seemingly unfair when a member would be perfect with counting her points and doing her exercises and still not lose weight, or even gain a pound or so, while someone who was sure they'd gained at least a few pounds due to a party or a trip or whatever discovered they'd lost weight.

Again- that diet mentality. The fact is, is that we are not machines where intake always matches up with expectation. 
You cannot believe all of the reasons I heard at the scale when people had not lost weight or had gained. Some of these reasons were very intimate, the least of which would probably involve PMS. Weight Watcher leaders hear it all. And truthfully, the reasons are often valid. Ask any woman who is still menstruating if her jeans fit her the same every day of the month. She will tell you that no, they do not. 
But those numbers, my GOD how important they were. And we are taught from an early age that what the scale says when we step on it is not just an indication of our physical weight, but a measurement of our very ability to control our appetites, a moral indicator of our willpower and strength. And even if a Weight Watchers leader, or even a doctor, never says a shaming word, we take those numbers into ourselves as proof of our failure and lack of will power.

I can't tell you how many people dread getting on the scale at the doctor's with every fiber of their being. I, being one of them. And Dr. Zorn has never said ONE WORD about me needing to lose weight. Never once has he said, "You know, if you lost some weight, your blood pressure might not be so high." 

Doesn't matter. Step on the scale, face the reality, feel like a total shit human being. 

Not everyone. Thank god. But many. 

And it's not just doctor's offices and weight loss programs where our weight is taken. We weigh ourselves. When I was the closest I ever came to anorexia (not even knowing there was a name for it), I weighed not only daily but several times a day. It was ridiculous. Looking back, I realize how much I was judging my 25-year old self for what that scale said every time I stepped on it. 

After I left Weight Watchers and after I had finally given up trying to maintain a lower but normal healthy weight because I just couldn't deal with that constant feeling of having to monitor every bite that went into my mouth and having that constant hunger that really had nothing to do with physical hunger, I quit weighing myself. I just stopped. The only scale in this house is this one.

A good old beam scale. Ironically, I got that scale from Weight Watchers when they changed over from those scales to more modern ones that actual people in the actual world used at the time. I think I had to pay like $25 for it or something but I paid it and lugged it home and here it's been ever since. The grandchildren are fascinated by it. It clunks when you use it and makes other metallic noises. You have to slide things about to make the thing balance. It is cool. And also, it's pretty darn accurate. 

Mr. Moon uses it sometimes but I have not used it in years and years. 

The day after I took my first Zepbound injection though, I decided I might as well step on it to get a baseline and that the world would not come to an end if I weighed myself once a week. And so I did.

Today I gave myself the third dose of the medication that I am taking and I got on the scale again. I am definitely and certainly not going to be sharing those numbers with anyone. I am not even going to report what the scale says. And already I can tell that my mind is leaping right back to that diet mentality of judging what's going on with my body by what the numbers are. 

These issues are real and they are interesting and they are telling. 

Here are pictures of more pleasant things.

All of my favorite colors. 

The potatoes I dug up today. There are many, many more. 

I almost want to weep with pureness of this magnolia. 

Happy Friday, y'all. 

Love...Ms. Moon