Manic gardening

I just put my bougainvillea outside. For the last 2 springs, I let her summer indoors. Before that, for 12 years give or take, I religiously migrated her. She would grow big and flower during the summer, then I'd have to chop her back to fit inside so she could survive and commiserate with me over the winter. This to me is a harbinger of good things ahead- that my bougainvillea is outside. It is also alarming to me that I have tempted fate by putting the plant outside for the first time in 2 years. To have something horrible happen and then have to re-evaluate my harbingers.

I was sitting around over analysing (who me?) this earlier. More accurately, I was over analysing while getting lunches ready, writing a tuition check for H's preschool that I forgot to drop off, letting dogs in and out and answering a thousand rounds of Mooommmmy!..." not while sitting. What does it mean that I am insistent on this plant existing?

Is it because for me bougainvilleas embody Mexico? My bougainvillea makes me heartsick home sick, after all these years. Is it the stubborn/superstitious angle? I will control this plant thriving out of its element. I'm afraid it means something if this plant ceases to exist, see above harbinger fear. Or is it just another angle of my obsessive plant collecting and manic gardening bug.. no... swarm?

Its mostly D all of the above, but I've had a day true to obsessive garden swarm. So I'll go with that.

I got the grass cut today- which is no small feat to do during H and S's waking hours. Well, S was asleep, and I promised H she could "water" the garden when I finished mowing, which would buy me some time to do some much needed weeding. The "..." is because H waters every thing but the garden, including me, when she waters the garden. This time I made her change before I gave her the hose. She came downstairs in white shorts, a white shirt and pink and blue water shoes. I don't know why white clothes seemed to be better candidates for getting wet, and in fact I didn't know she had any white clothes as she generally refuses to wear anything with out color.

Getting watered while weeding turned out to be the manic garden hors d'oeuvre. The real mania came after dinner, when my neighbors who were dividing their iris gave some to me. I was already outside torturing my children, making them mulch and telling them it was fun. Now I was hell bent on planting the iris before bed time. S was screaming because dirt kept getting in her sandals. H was HYSTERICAL because a worm pooped in her hand. The dogs were chasing each other in crazy figure eights around us all. I was focused. Must. plant. iris. I got them planted. Then I decided to move them. H says "can we go to bed now?" She had been asking all day if she could go to bed early. But no. I had to plant the iris. No sleep until the iris are planted.

In the midst of the planting mania, worm poop phobic children, spastic dogs, and bed time pleas- I was startled to see a bird jump out at me. My crazy slacker robin has returned. For 2 springs now, I've had a gardening robin. I'm not sure if its the same one, or if this whole robin family is like this- but this robin has discovered its easier to let me do the digging for worms, and he sits there, close enough that I could reach out and touch him, and waits for me to dig. Then swoops in and scares the crap out of me as he pounces on worms. He's been known to follow me around and give me cockeyed critical looks about my gardening frequency. "Hmm. A lot of weeds, there lady. Perhaps you need to dig some of them up? Just sayin."

I finally, somehow, got the irises planted and re planted. I hurried to get the hose and give them a soak so their roots could get comfy. I looked up from the hose to see S running at me full speed ahead- S, the one who won't walk on the grass. I stared at her, transfixed, completely confused as to why shes running towards me. Not upset, just running. She got to where I was and stuck her head full on into the hose spray. I was choking, I was laughing so hard while my daughter, who had a previous cat like aversion to water - so much so that she wouldn't bathe unless held down, is jumping in front of the hose so it sprays her in the face, running to me to dry her face on my shirt and doing it again and again. H sees the chance to re-water herself and is soaked in no time. She had changed back into the clothes she had changed out of earlier when she was playing with the hose. Why I even bother I'll never know. "Tomorrow we should bring the toothbrushes out here too!" H yells gleefully. It was easier than a bath- I'll give them that.