Messy
November 5th, 2007 by Kristin Green
Were you ever scolded as a child -or do you scold your own children- for making a mess? The answer for most of us is probably “you bet”. I submit though that it’s in our natural nature to love a good mess. I think it’s satisfying to fling things and gratifying to tidy up. This morning I admired the aftermath of this weekend’s storm (nature flung things).
My boss, Julie had already picked up sticks in the Bosquet and made piles – sometimes I think she’s actually tempted to go out in a storm and catch sticks as they fall. When I asked Fred if he wanted/needed extra hands (mine) to help clean up he said “it’s not that bad. Unless you have a burning desire to pick up sticks…” I don’t. It’s always less fun to pick up someone else’s mess, don’t you think?
So after doing some stick-picking-up anyway, I made my own mess.
I love to pot up. The potting shed is designed to contain messes. 
I can spill soil with wanton abandon and groom dead leaves straight onto a floor pile. I don’t have to be careful of the furniture! Today I took the wedding pots apart and divided and repotted the phormiums. Phormiums (New Zealand flax) aren’t as hard to divide as you’d think. 
I set them on the floor and parted the blades until I found a mid point with at least a semblance of a seam between the fans of blades. Then I stabbed the seam with my hori-hori and wrestled until I felt and heard the rip tear of roots. It was totally satisfying mess making… and I can’t put off the gratification of cleaning up any longer… Do you have a place you can make a proud and uncareful mess?
It just occurred to messy-me that I should tell you that those fingernails will be clean next Thursday for the Annual Garden Design Luncheon and there are still some seats available!
November 6th, 2007 at 8:28 am
That last picture is pretty much how I look after a day of gardening. If you add a dirt-streaked face and twigs in your hair. Oh, and ground-in dirt on my feet where soil slipped into my garden clogs.
When you look like that, you know you’ve gotten a lot of good stuff done.
November 6th, 2007 at 4:25 pm
Pam, Filthy (and proud of it) is such a normal fashion for me that the volunteers and other people who see me every day sometimes don’t recognize me right away when I’m clean!
November 6th, 2007 at 7:26 pm
I wish I had an area to make miss in. I only have a balcony so making any mess it’s very hard to sweep it all up. Normally I just sweep it over the edge when I don’t have much but I’m sure my downstairs neighbors dont like that. To me the funnest part is making the mess and so not cleaning it up. I would like messes to clean themselves.
November 7th, 2007 at 12:24 am
Mess is my middle name–and what really bugs me is my dearly beloved trying to cleanup the mess while I’m still weeding/making supper/potting plants/baking muffins…it seems ridiculous to me to get cleaned up before the messmaking is finished. I think making a mess is cathartic, but then when things ARE cleaned up, that’s cathartic too…
which reminds me…I was sorting clothes this morning and I think the containers are still all over the bed. Unless hubby cleaned up THAT mess…. tee hee!
November 7th, 2007 at 3:09 pm
Vanillalotus, Sweeping over the balcony edge is a lot like sweeping under the rug – you can probably only get away with it for so long…
Jodi, I think you’ve got a keeper and a gem – someone to pick up your piles! Come on! That’d be a dream come true… I suppose though if he’s bugged by the mess and you’re bugged by the tidiness, the conflict could be … messy!