Dow plunges below 10,000. Here's a dahlia to distract and comfort you.

  Fantastic Dahlias 
  Originally uploaded by GraceD

Oh, the flower doesn't cut it?  Yeah, I'm with you on that,  but I thought I would try.  Nice try, eh? Gaaah!

Before you go back to monitoring your 401(k) and trying to placate your mother whose retirement portfolio is going south along with your 401(k), I have a tiny bit of unsolicited but perhaps helpful advice - you might want to take up gardening.  I know, you'd rather take up gardening if involves picking up a hoe to wave it around menacingly in the peasant revolt coming to a village near you.  I hear you, I'll be at that anti-government demonstration, too.  But, there is a great deal of solace that comes with using these landscaping tools  in the dirt, whether for dahlia bulb planting or digging a patch of your yard for an organic veggie garden.

I've been hiding out in my own patch of earth, prepping the soil for perennial and vegetable planting.  Here in our part of Northern California, we do our Spring planting in October, before the winter rains that abate in March.  That must sound odd to you dollins outside our climate zone.  While you're raking leaves, we're doing that too along with planting baby delphinium plants and sweet pea seeds.  Last week, I flung a quarter of a pound of native California wildflower seeds on a bare hill.  We'll have a nice field of velvety wildflower seedlings by Christmas and full bloom in late February. 

Getting down and dirty in this wholesome way has saved me on many levels.  Gardening gets me out of my ever buzzing head.  The mind chatter disappears when I'm triple digging compost into our hard clay soil.  Afterwards, I feel like I've done a yoga practice session - hurting (A LOT) but clear headed, calm and grateful.

The downside to getting lost in the compost and multiple packets of seeds is that I don't want to do anything else.  I become a hermit, a cloistered monk.  I have to be dragged away from the raised beds (which will be planted with fava beans for ground cover over the winter, then dug into the dirt in the Spring as a nitrogen rich soil conditioner), then shoved into the shower to get cleaned up for dinner, the movies, or to the book signing last Saturday in San Francisco -  a  big, happy fun time that deserves its own post and a bunch of links to spectacular bloggers/friends who politely said nothing about the dirt under my nails.

(I will say this one thing about the book signing - Maggie Mason, arbiter of excellent style, loved the Hubs' red rimmed glasses.  I couldn't stop talking about Mighty Girl's validation of the Hubs' taste on the 60 mile drive back to Santa Cruz.)

So, for today - more shoveling, raking and planting; writing; Jack Russell Terrier and teenage daughter wrangling and the occasional peek at the business news.  I will try my best to "Keep Calm and Carry On."  I hope you will, too.

Comments

[mamadaisy]

damn, that is one gorgeous flower!

I don't know about everyone else, but I feel better.

[GraceD]

mamadaisydollin, if you feel better, my work here is done.

Love - Grace

[Miss Grace]

Also, if the world as we know it really is about to come to an end (admittedly doubtful), vegetable gardening keeps the cost of food down at least.

I'm so bummed with myself for not going to SF Saturday. I couldn't find a sitter, so at least it wasn't JUST me being lazy, but I was really looking forward to the book signing. Sigh.

[Rhi]

Did you know that my hometown is the Dahlia Capital of the WORLD?

Because it is :)

[Kris]

Yep, we need to grow our own grub, because we won't be able to afford to buy any soon. I'm going to have to become a vegetarian soon, cause I'm not buying a cow.

My 401k has plunged 31% this year (so far). Good thing I'm 41, not 61.

[phhhst]

Enjoyed your post. Nice pairing - economy with gardening. I had a massage therapist tell me a long time ago to get out in the garden and get out of my busy head.

[ByJane]

is that what's wrong with my garden--that i'm still attending to it on an east coast schedule????