Beets of Joy

Today’s Reverb10 prompt: Ordinary joy. Our most profound joy is often experienced during ordinary moments. What was one of your most joyful ordinary moments this year?

My response: for me, this prompt is conflicted. How is anything ordinary if it inspires profound joy?

Then: an ordinary moment for me in the summer is to walk into my backyard vegetable and annual flower garden to see what’s changed in the last day, week, fortnight or however long it has been since the last time I visited. Note: this last summer was very rainy and additionally, I did not feel like weeding. Consequently, weeks could go by before I visited the wee green beings back there. But if something monumental happened during that visit, like a new sunflower varietal budding, a bush bean plant suddenly having pods, a beet plant suddenly showing off its red, or even wispy little carrot leaves peeked out from the earth, I experienced powerful joy.

I’ve been a gardener for about five years, and the child of a avid gardener for … well, many more years than five. I’ve always loved flowers, but once I got a yard of my own, my springs, summers and falls have changed dramatically. There is so much going on out there, and some of it, I even enabled and even planned and designed. Beauty, and I had something to do with it! The growth, colors, patterns, movement, and cycles are simply wondrous. It’s a good thing we have a long, cold winter, so that I can rest my eyes and bones, and make new plans for the coming growing season.