Her Third Child

My mother is a fantastic gardener. She is also an obsessive one. Because of her tireless and occaisonally fanatical efforts, the backyard that I grew up in, a wide (for downtown Toronto), bumpy expanse of grass and bushes, is now a lush, dense garden that literally makes people walking by stop and stare. I can't count the number of mornings I've woken up, wandered around the house calling and calling for my mom, freaked out, dialed every number where I could conceiveably reach her, and then found her in the garden, bum in the air and hands in the dirt, happy as anything. I, on the other hand, complain bitterly about losing my childhood playground, where I used to "play baseball", "play tag" and "play croquet"

Er, for the above, read: "thwack at the t-ball stand and then cry," "run for two minutes, bang my knee, and then cry," and "sit on top of a pile of croquet balls and cluck like a chicken for 30 minutes, fall on my ass when they inevitabley roll away, spot a big bug, run inside, and then cry." I was an outdoorsy child, obviously.
But there are some summer evenings, where the garden and I can make peace, declare a truce, and give each other some happiness. And last night was one of those.

Maybe I'll learn to share *some* of my stuff with my leafy little sister. Eventually. One day. If she's good.