keep on weeding

Readers and friends of this letter know I like gardening. For one thing, it’s a great metaphor for living, as I recently wrote.

I don’t pretend to be a great gardener, but I have learned a few things. One is that weeding, for me, is a great stress releaser. Five years ago – to the weekend – I was hard at work cutting, weeding and pulling up every superfluous thing in my back yard garden. It was because my husband was gravely ill in a hospital bed and I was having to contemplate life and death decisions. His life. His death. I came home from the hospital that day, and went outside. It was a sunny day like today was, warm enough to work up a dirty sweat but not so humid or hot as to be unsafe or intolerable. Hours went by until I exhausted myself and came inside to clean up, feeling better and clearer about what was to come.

For some people, punching a heavy bag works. Others like a good run or other vigorous exercise. Maybe you like to take a long drive to nowhere or work on a do-it-yourself project or play an instrument. Whatever works to take you out of your worries and into the flow of some other effort, especially if it involves movement, seems to help divert attention from the worry at hand, at least for a while. And that distraction may be just what we need at that moment.

It was actually my husband who taught me most of what I know about gardening. He loved it and was entirely self-taught. Besides the benefit of making something look good, or growing something that tastes good, I’m sure he was drawn to the practice for the diversion of it. It was a way to shed the responsibilities of the work day and shift his mental gears into something like a contemplative practice. He was outside every evening that he could be. I’m grateful to him for showing me the way.

Do the practice, see the benefit, and do it again. There’s always something else that needs attention. This many years later, I’m still weeding.

© 2026 www.megreilly360.com

6/29/26