Remember this photo from a few weeks back? At that point, I was using it to illustrate sustainable gardening. Today I am using it to tell you that it has become my “waterloo,” for lack of a better word.
What do I mean by that? Well, when I originally posted the photo, it said that I wouldn’t clean up this garden until the soil temperature had reached 50 degrees.
Okay, well, that’s happened and the garden still looks like this, except with a little more growing in it. Ugh! And every time I walk the dog, I walk right by it and I cringe. And I think, wow! If I am cringing, what do other people think?
Now they (the “other” people I refer to) know that people live here and are still gardening here because I did manage to get one of the other roadside gardens cleaned up.
But in fact that’s partly what the problem is. Cleanup this year is taking longer than usual. I am finding a lot more deadwood than in prior years–not the least bit unexpected, but all that pruning takes time. So when I think that I can get something done in an hour, it’s taking 2 or maybe 4.
But the whole point of this post is to say that gardening should NOT be stressful. So what if it takes me longer to clean up! There isn’t a time clock on this. It might be slightly more difficult to work around plants that are growing but it’s also a bonus to see the plants coming back.
And it’s always a pleasure to be outside among the birds singing–which they do constantly this time of year.
We have just had a wonderful rain which will make weeding so much easier. I can’t wait to get back outside again to get to this and the other gardens that still need a little helping hand from me.
Gardendaze 
That was what I disliked about the lawn in front of the former home in town. I needed to maintain it because it was in a suburban home, but I dislike it. I found the maintenance to be somewhat distressful, or at least not enjoyable. Oh well, it looked sort of good.
I give a lecture about how to garden smarter and not harder. So I was thinking–in light of that lecture–if there was anything that I could do differently. There really isn’t much. I didn’t even plant those plants. They are natives that self-sowed and they late season nectar for the pollinators. I leave the stems for the insects. So cutting back the stems, once a year is about as low maintenance as it gets! It’s only stressful looking at it until I do it!