This was a few hours worth of me saying, "Oh, it just needs a little more tension and support!" It didn't work.

Greener Grass - Of Sprinklers And of Hammocks

Adminisk8or

08/05/2024

I can't deny, there's just something I really, honestly love about the summer months. And yet, at the same time, between the intense heat of this August and the boatload of projects I still have to do before the season sets in, it sometimes feels like I only get to enjoy so much of it. But let's be honest- I'm just so lucky that I get to, at all.

One of these fun projects came in the form of irrigation work at my house. I had noticed the front distribution box on my sprinklers was flooding and getting swampy. So, I dangerously turned off the main line and let the lawn and greenery get a little toasty for several or so days, until the box dried up. Finally, to fix the issue (and it wasn't the worst fix in the world), I had to keep myself hot in competition with the yellow jackets who kept eyeballing the fresh, muddy, shaded box as a nice condominium- but thanks to some water-diluted vinegar and a garden trowel, that wasn't the worst task in the world. No, honestly, putting in the new distribution box in my backyard was the hard part- and I mean literally hard. I haven't dug into soil that solidly baked for quite a moment. It'll be nice when I rent a trencher to run the actual lines, so I'm not fighting against hard-baked clay, rocks and occasional thick roots.

And then there was the side project that sort came out of left field. My parents-in-law said I could have a broken hammock frame, as I was interested in seeing if I could get it fixed. I spent a few hours the other night attempting to do so. ...and as you can see by the photo on this post, the end result was... well, let's face it, something even Rube Goldberg would sit and scratch his head at. In any case, it very nearly worked. I gently put my weight onto it, sitting still and it seemed to hold okay. And then I proceeded to lay down and distribute my weight, and that's when the whole frame itself suddenly shifted and bent out of whack. And that's when I knew it was time to give it up. But the good news is the hammock, itself survived, and now sits quite nicely in a much better frame in our back yard.

And I got to lay out in it a nice moment, tonight. It was just me, the rushing, warm August evening winds and the fading dusk as stars came out one by one. My only company was a citronella candle, my phone, and my wife inside the house.

I'm thankful for moments like that. If I didn't let myself sit things out for a moment, sometimes, I believe the stress of bills, debt and other things would eat away at me at a much faster rate than it already does. I suppose that's important to think about, sometimes- you see people with things- nicer things than you- and you assume they have it all made. And yeah, sometimes they do, let's not pretend that doesn't happen, right? But perhaps more often than we like to admit, there are, as a good hymn puts it, "sorrows that the eye can't see".

I certainly won't sit here and pretend that a lucky son of a gun like me, who is happily married into a good family, owns a house (albeit with a pretty hefty bill to accompany it every month), has a good paying job in which I like what I do, and above all, that I have good faith and spiritual knowledge and know where I'm going more or less- I won't pretend that I don't have it really good, because I know I'm far more blessed in those aspects than I really deserve. But I hope that, in spite of these blessings, that people who know me or at least talk to me can see through the undeserved gifts and see that we (both my wife and I) have our own challenges and demons to fight- and depending on the day, it really, truly is an uphill battle of a fight.

Above all, I hope that I don't allow myself to become blind to such things in others, as I know I've been guilty of doing many times. It's just human nature to see the greener grass on the front lawn, feel natural jealousy at how easily it comes to another, while their backyard is not only dead and barren, but may even be on fire while you are so focused on what you can see. Hopefully all reading this will stop and think about it a bit this week- and hopefully, others will do the same for your sake. But until next week, see ya!