Out In The Air

I was out in the garden yesterday…

(The readers all sit forward intently sensing this is going to be a high-tension and controversial post… not!)

If left to my own devices, I would probably sit inside for most of the time.  Those things I like best; books, computers, telly, bed… they’re all indoors (yes, I’ve been allowed bring the bed back in, didn’t I update you on that?  Sorry.)

But yesterday, I ventured out.

I should explain a bit.  I go out loads, I work all week and that keeps me out quite a lot.  But my Lovely Wife tends to work evenings and all of the weekend, at the moment, so that keeps me around the house quite a bit with the kids.  I have few complaints about this.  Like I said, I like it here.

But the point of this little post is simply this.  It was Good to go outside.  Really Good.

God knows, I didn’t do anything glamorous, out there in the back garden.  In fact, I was cleaning drains and such.  About half way through, it started to pour with rain and I didn’t mind that either.  I'm a bit like Br’er Rabbit, I was born and bred in a shower patch.  If I was inside, looking out, the rain would have seemed an insurmountable barrier to doing anything out there.  Outside, though, looking in, it was no bother at all.

When I eventually came back in, I was tired and in bad need of tea and much (much) more contended than before I went out.

The lesson learned is therefore ‘Go Out into Your Garden More, Fool’.

Well, yes – that – but a little more too, I reckon.

It’s more about the change of routine, the change of scenery.  That’s a good thing, a booster, a tonic.

And you don’t have to go half-way round the world to get it.  You don’t have to jet off to sunnier climes or hit the big city or the mountain or the beach.  You just have to do something Different.

And my lesson, I reckon, is that it doesn’t matter how small that different thing you do is, so long as it is Different.  Even moving from one room to another can perhaps be beneficial...



At this point, perhaps, you may well say, “What the hell is he on about?”

It’s just another Pep Talk, really.  For me.

I won’t get to travel very far this year, pretty much like last year and the year before that… and next year.  So, in the words of our parents, I'll have to ‘Make My Own Fun’.  I'll have to remind myself that fun and relaxation and peace do not necessarily lie a thousand miles away via charter jet.  All those things can lie right outside in my back garden…

… in the drains.


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5 comments:

Luce said...

It's true that a change is as good as a rest. But it's also true that getting out and doing something physical in the fresh air is massively beneficial to body and soul. I know this because I started running a year ago and this has been the first year in the past ten that I've managed to survive the winter without resorting to Prozac.

And as you know, I'm a passionate gardener. And by this I mean 'tending to my patch', which transforms itself through the seasons from wintry quagmire to summer Eden. Nothing gives such a sense of well-being as coming indoors, cheeks glowing and muscles aching, after a hard day grafting in the garden

Sam said...

Ahhh, the smell of fresh drains...

Jim Murdoch said...

As I may have mentioned before when we were looking for a flat to buy (or to be more accurate when Carrie was looking for a flat to buy because I was working myself into the ground and could only talk/think/dream about work) in one of my more lucid moments I placed two conditions upon her: 1) that we could both have our own offices (a no-brainer that one) and 2) no garden of any sort, type or description. Needless to say that’s what she found and that’s where we’ve been living for eight years in our bi-officed, sans-gardened bliss. When my father died he not only left my mother but he also left a garden that needed tending and since my siblings had both buggered off to live in England that duty fell to me. Luckily for my mum I am dutiful by nature and so on regular occasions throughout the summer and not-so-regular occasions throughout the winter I got on the train and did my duty. And I hated every single soddin’ second of it. Don’t get me wrong, I like Nature – I am grateful on a daily basis for the oxygen it provides (I’ve been a life-long user and would highly recommend the stuff) but I like Nature like I like cakes; I like to see cakes and eat cakes but I have zero little interest in making cakes.

JeannetteLS said...

First visit. I must leave my garden behind when--IF we sell the house this season. But I do know that the first time the ground is revealed I go out and meander, in search of curled shoots. My garden has been my peace and my adventure for several years now. My exotic adventures live in my demented little brain. Anyway, I am enjoying your blog very much. I'm learning about container gardens now...

Laura said...

Too much snow to enjoy the garden here yet. It's under there, I've seen it come through every year so far. :)