Gardening

It's already been two weeks since the water hose and I would spend about two hours in each other's hands every morning. The two hours of watering the plants in my Mom's garden, just letting the water soak the soil where the plant is rooted, and staring as the dry soil absorbs the water has taught me two lessons about life and relationships.

In my mom's garden, there are plants growing so beautifully while there are also those that seem dying. During the first few days of my being a gardener, I saw myself in those dying plants - those that seemed abandoned, not given proper care, and just left out there to grow on its, probably.
That's what probably happened to me before I knew about my condition. I was not literally abandoned, but I was emotionally abandoned, deprived of the care and affection and just left on my own to grow. This is also what happens to many people. Many people may be physically abandoned but we probably don't realize that in the midst of what seems to be a complete family, there are those members of the family that suffer from emotional abandonment. Emotional abandonment is for me, the absence of communication and affection. It may seem cheesy or for others they would say, "That's not a culture in our family" but communication and affection are for me, the only ways that could nurture someone so she may grow beautiful and happy.
Just like taking care of a garden by watering it everyday, making someone grow to be a beautiful and happy person would mean, communicating and showing affection everyday.

That is lesson number 1.

When I saw a dying plant, I talked to her and told her "You're gonna live, okay? You're not gonna give up. You'll be okay. I will take care of you." I chuckled after saying that. I found it a bit funny that I want this plant to live while I, would sometimes, just want to die. How could I want this plant live and I die? Ironic, eh?

Anyway, I think that's what also happens in a dying relationship. When we see that there seems no life anymore in the relationship, that's when we try to make it work, to have the life back again. We try to do everything that we can just to have everything back to what was once beautiful but it's too late. We probably don't realize that to put life in any relationship, it needs nurturing everyday. Those two people in a relationship, nurture it, not only one of them. If it's just one of the two, it's a useless effort for s/he would eventually be worn out.

That is lesson number 2.

So, you see (and I see, too), we can probably go around spending time asking people, reading books, listening to sermons, browsing through online articles about how to live or how to be in a relationship but, sometimes, what it only takes to learn these things about life and relationships, are a reflective and listening mind and heart and maybe, yes, a seemingly mundane activity such as gardening.

Happy gardening!