Today, an estimated one billion people in 190 countries will take part in Earth Day activities, according to earthday.org. What about you? What are your concerns about the environment? Do you plan to do anything different this year? Participate in any Earth Day events?

Whatever you choose to do, I wish you a happy Earth Day! Now I think I’ll go outside to enjoy the beautiful Spring weather and give thanks for the blessing of green grass, flowers and fresh air.

What I’m learning from this is that sometimes you have to take a step backwards to take two steps forward. I’m willing to do that with and for the horse I’ve dreamed of all my life. I’m willing to make mistakes and look foolish if it helps me towards my goal of being the owner he deserves.


What about you? What big, hairy goal would you like to accomplish—and what steps, even steps backward, are you willing to take to get there?

The gardens themselves looked great, considering the hard winter we had. (I know anyone from the North reading this is snorting their coffee thinking of Florida’s “hard winter,” but truthfully, the landscape here was pretty ravaged.) It’s a pleasure to stroll through the grounds any time, but especially so when booths filled with blooming flowers, herbs, orchids and rare and exotic fruit trees line the walkways. We wandered by the butterfly garden, a newly-installed carnivorous plant area, and a gently tumbling stream.


At the festival (and isn’t “festival” a happy word full of color and music and celebration?), local plant clubs and societies as well as commercial growers from throughout the state sell everything from African violets, orchids, bromeliads and bonsai to bougainvillea, native plants, camellias, tropical fruit trees, palms, carnivorous plants and more. Of course you can purchase plants, but if you have a plant-related question, someone here knows the answer and is happy to share it with you.

I had a list of plants I wanted to buy to replace some of the casualties from our freezing winter, and secretly I hoped to find one or two interesting orchids to add to my ever-growing obsess…—I mean collection. I came home with two orchids, some basil (my seedlings have mysteriously disappeared from their starter flat), chocolate mint, a geranium and a Ptilotus Joey, a plant I’d never heard of before.

I would have bought more, but there was just too much to choose from! I’ve discovered that I become paralyzed and unable to make a decision when faced with too much variety, and end up choosing nothing. Sometimes that happens to me in life, too. I have so many interests and responsibilities that I become overwhelmed and instead of partaking of the delicious abundance available, I shut down and do nothing, letting things pile up around me. I retreat into the safety of a book or a TV show, or I do nothing but the menial and unimportant, neglecting the things that are of real value to me.

Perhaps my word of the year should have been “simplify” instead of “open.” But then I would be going against part of my very nature—the part that wants to taste and touch and explore and learn. The trick is finding a way to do it without overwhelming myself—somehow making my way though the garden festival of life without losing myself in its riot of color and scent.

Last night our local pro baseball team played its season-opening game. They won in a most exciting fashion, with left fielder Carl Crawford knocking in the tying and winning runs in the bottom of the ninth. Go Rays!




In some ways, baseball is my favorite sport to watch on TV. Aside from the attraction of athletic men in uniforms, I like the somewhat cerebral nature of the game. I find it restful. I can do a crossword puzzle, sketch, read the paper, surf the net (I’ve got a game on now, as I type)—and still not miss anything. Baseball’s leisurely pace allows me to watch the action (and yes, there IS action) as well as putter around the house. I don’t know why, but this appeals to me.


Even watching a baseball game in person is relatively relaxing. The Rays’ stadium is an air-conditioned dome in St. Petersburg, a blessing in muggy, thunderstorm-y Florida. We’ve made many happy memories in the stands, eating peanuts, hot dogs and cotton candy (and pizza and chicken tenders…). Once, when our son was in Little League, we marched around the field with other uniformed Little League teams while the pros warmed up. We’ve appeared on the “Kiss Cam” on the JumboTron and my husband once caught a foul ball. We went wild with excitement when the Rays went from last in the league in 2007 to the World Series in 2008.

If you want to know more about baseball, I suggest It Takes More Than Balls: The Savvy Girls’ Guide to Understanding and Enjoying Baseball by Deidre Silva and Jackie Koney. (With me, there’s always a book recommendation.)

The Rays have just taken the lead over the Orioles. Time to hunt up my sketchbook and settle in for the duration.

I once heard Stephen King recommend reading a poem every night before going to sleep.  He reads poetry himself, and writes it, too.

Stephen King?!  The King of Horror?!

Whether or not you enjoy Stephen King's works, if you've read him, you know that the man has a way with words--he's definitely a poet, even in prose. I admire his skill (even as I pull the covers over my head).

April is National Poetry Month, and I'm celebrating by dusting off the poetry books on my bedside table and reading a poem every night before bed.  


National Poetry Month attempts “to widen the attention of individuals and the media to the art of poetry, to living poets, to our complex poetic heritage, and to poetry books and journals of wide aesthetic range and concern,” according to the American Academy of Poets, sponsors of the event.

If you’re interested in participating in National Poetry Month, you can sign up for a poem-a-day email for the month of April here. Or download a free iTunes app called "Poem Flow" (an animated version of a poem reads itself to you).

Here are a few more simple things you can do (taken from http://www.poets.org/):

Google a poem. Do you have a line of verse running through your head? Many people do…and with the simple click of a mouse, they can discover where that line came from and explore the rest of the poem.

Buy a book of poems for your library. Many libraries have been hit by funding cuts, and would greatly appreciate the donation of a book of poetry.

Add verse to your email signature. Your email program may allow you to create a personalized signature that gets automatically added to the end of every email you send.

And, of course,

Read a book of poetry. (Or even just one poem, for that matter.)

Where to start? I’ve written about American Life in Poetry here and it remains one of my favorite places to explore poetry. In addition, here are two of my favorite books for sampling poetry or learning about it in general: Poet’s Choice: Poems for Everyday Life (selected and introduced by Robert Hass) and Poetry Daily: 366 Poems from the World’s Most Popular Poetry Website.

On a more fanciful note, try reading If I Were in Charge of the World and Other Worries (subtitled “poems for children and their parents”) or How Did I Get to Be 40…& Other Atrocities, both by Judith Viorst. Also, Love that Dog is one of the most touching books I’ve ever read, and one of the best examples of how poetry can enrich your daily life.

I know poetry is not to everyone’s taste, but I hope if you give it a chance, you’ll find it can be part of your life. Happy reading!

Last Holiday. Georgia opens herself to all the good things in life, and instead of losing it all, gains even more.

American Dreamer. (Synopsis for those who have never heard of this movie: A housewife wins a writing contest, and the prize is a trip to Paris. On the way to a luncheon in her honor, she is hit by a car and wakes in the hospital convinced she is “Rebecca Ryan,” the main character in the series of books the contest was based on. Mayhem ensues.) What’s not to like about someone named Kathy winning a writing contest and going to Paris?

My Life in Ruins. I originally wanted to see this because it takes place in many of the Greek sites I visited on my own life-changing trip nearly three years ago. I’ll keep coming back to it, because of the lovely message about regaining your kefi, or zest for living.

Thinking about these movies, I realized I had a sort of theme emerging: woman leaves husband/job/ordinary life, goes to foreign country and “finds herself.” Hmm. I wonder what that says about me? Perhaps I think I have to travel somewhere, leaving my ordinary life, in order to learn about myself and what I really want. I do know that I love to watch women opening up to the world, stepping outside their comfort zones to embrace life, probably because in general I’m such a big chicken about doing that myself. I live vicariously through them, when I’m not willing or able to buy a house in Italy or spend all my savings on food and clothes and snowboarding in Europe.

I suspect I’m not alone in having a theme arise in my favorite movies. When I mentioned my theme to my mother-in-law, she noted that many of her favorite movies have a road trip theme. In fact, she’ll rent or borrow a movie she’s never heard of before if it includes a road trip. (My husband’s theme seems to be good triumphing over evil, after a heck of a lot of blood loss.)

What are your favorite feel-good movies? Do they have an underlying theme and what do you think that means? Share them, and maybe I’ll have some new ones to add to my list.