Before I assumed my roles as mother, gardener, wife (and consequently, martyr) I had a desk job. For years I was Director of Admissions at Oklahoma City University and eventually a consultant to small, private colleges around the country. During my stint at OCU, I worked with an extremely talented and energetic woman who headed up the nationally-renowned and super successful dance program. She was a whirling, working dervish, rarely stopping to breathe or take a well-deserved rest. But then Christmas or spring break would roll around, imposing an intermission, if not true respite, from her daily, frantic productivity.
I remember her once saying that, in a way, she dreaded these breaks from the routine. Not because she didn't enjoy getting off the gerbil wheel once in a while, but because, once the rhythm of her work and days were interrupted, she had such a hard time getting back into the groove. Such a hard time re-establishing the cadence and momentum of her 'usual' life and work.
And there, in a nutshell, is where I am. Another trip home to Indiana interrupted my daily rhythms. Not unlike that garden design principle of creating rhythm and pattern and cohesion by repeating a design element (be it a plant or pot or tuteur) across a space, I feel unsettled, out of sorts, and, well, discumbobulated when I get home. My patterns and habits interrupted, my rigidity mocked, my discipline to get back on track tested.
No place is this more apparent than this blog. A week without internet access disrupts even my cyber practices, and I struggle to get back into this ongoing conversation with you, my dears. But back I am.
So, I ask you, do you ever feel this way, my darlings?