Seasonal Changes

I mowed the lawn today. It is amazing the inspirations that come to me while I am mowing or pulling weeds. I take after my mother in that regard. I do some of my best praying with my hands in the dirt. When I tell someone that yard work and painting are therapeutic for me, they look at me like the fertilizer or paint fumes have affected my brain. Actually, I think it is not the activity, but where my mind goes during those exercises that is therapy.

The interesting thing about my delight in mowing today is that I reveled in the spring-like response my yard is having to my care. We arrived in this little rent house in the extreme heat of early August. The previous tenants (males) did not do yardwork...my neighbors let me know that the first week. They were clearly feeling me out to see if we were "gardeners," hoping the eyesore across the street wouldn't continue to decline. It was evident. The grass was thinned to almost gone and everything was brown and dry and withering. You could hear the crunch with your eyes!

Remarkably, just turning the irrigation system back on, some heavy pruning and mowing, and six week later this yard is on its way back! So, just as Autumn has begun, my yard is experiencing the rebirth of Spring. Ironic.

Anyway, as I mowed through newly thickened bermuda grass in my backyard, I was thanking God that what looked like a doomed situation had taken a sudden turn to life and promise. Even about six shrubs in the backyard, the variety of which I am unfamiliar with, have broken out into color. I am delighted with the potential for a lovely yard next spring and even think we can enjoy it this fall from the deck after all. Thank you, God!

The irony of this situation is not lost on me at all. This past year has been one of steady and frightening decline for the Shannon household. At times it felt like gloom and doom for sure.

The "Great Recession" had hit our family squarely and we were forced out of a community and home we loved dearly just in order to survive economically. It required my dedicated and hard-working husband to pack his bags and move to another state to work while the children and I remained behind to try to sell our house. This was so hard on all of us, but I know it was darkest for him. Winter truly FELT like winter in 2010 - dark, cold and lonely.

Hardest on me was that it hit at the same time many of my adult children were trying to find their way in the world as well. I worried so much about their ability to find work and fretted about where they would live if they didn't, because we were headed West. It was so hard to find work in their fields in South Carolina. It was harder for some than others. Our sweet newlyweds, Lauren and Alex had to take low-paying jobs just to cover student debt and gasoline - living with parents the first year of marriage. NOT what they had envisioned at all! (To their credit, they held their heads high during it all.) Ultimately they stepped out in faith to head westward also, in hopes of more fertile employment territory. Thankfully, that was a good decision and bore fruit quickly with good jobs in a town (Austin) they really like. The fact that it is down the highway from us in Waco is even better.

Now, the hardest challenge of all! Just three weeks after we moved into our new house in Hewitt, Texas, we get the devastating news that our precious new grandbaby in California, Clara Violet Boyle, has leukemia. I didn't think our lives could get any worse, but they just did. I already felt so dried up from the past year's journey that I was not sure I had anything left to run on. How could I even help my daughter bear such an inconceivable cross? Could we possibly endure this?

Well, of course, we can. And we are. Our yard may be dry and crunchy right now, and I only see drought ahead of us, but just moisture from the heavens and some pruning and cutting of damaged leaves and branches can turn it around to lush and green again. I know Who to ask for the water and I have been pruned and weeded and cut so many times in my life that I actually know which branches to stick out for shaping automatically, if not, I know the Master Gardener will reach in and tend to them anyway. God cares about the Shannon Garden. He planted it. He rejoices in it - as I do my silly, sickly backyard. It will turn green and lush again. I am sure of it.

And I will try to be patient. These things don't happen overnight. But my yard proves that spring can come in autumn and I know that the sun does shine in winter. By next summer, I plan on watching my little Clara run through the thick, green and healthy grass in my back yard, chasing the three bunnies that live there. They will both be healthier. I am counting on it!