Coming to terms with the tulips.

Today, my normally-vigorous morning yoga practice consisted of the following: four sun salutations, a few restorative poses, and a very long savasana in which I fell asleep. I don’t know what was going on with my body this morning but I listened to it, and that is what it said to do. Who am I to argue? I always feel great after my yoga practice and today was no exception, but I obviously felt more rested than normal.

My husband reminded me that I always feel a bit overwhelmed at this time of year, and he’s right. Part of it is my innate desire to DO EVERYTHING, but at this time of year I need to add to that my innate desire to DO ALL THE GARDENING. Alas, there are only so many hours in a day. I am itching to plant things today but there is snow in tomorrow’s forecast, alas, alas, and also I have actual work to do that does not involve the flower beds.

I currently have fifty – soon to be increased to sixty-six – annuals on my deck to be planted, and I suppose my husband was correct in saying that I used the spring plant fundraiser as an excuse to buy an excessive amount of flowers, but how could I resist? I’m giving the grass the side-eye, and in the meantime, this weekend my husband and I actually did dig up a bunch of tulips to make room for new daylilies.

The flowers awaiting planting, plus a bonus shot of my husband’s many barbeques.

The tulip thing is a real drag, and I am trying not to covet my neighbours’ bulbs, but a jaunt around the neighbourhood shows nothing but gorgeous, blooming, colourful tulips with healthy, uneaten foliage. Here are what some of the remaining tulips look like:

Missing from the photo are all the holes where the squirrels have dug up the rest of the bulbs. My friend (HI NICOLE) suggested cayenne pepper, but I have heard that squirrels can transfer the pepper from the paws to the eyes and end up clawing their own eyes out. Whether or not that is true, I don’t want to chance being responsible for a scurry of eyeless squirrels. I am pretty sure the sightless squirrels would haunt me, and I don’t want that kind of bad karma.

I also would worry about Barkley getting into the cayenne, and though you would think such a smart dog (Labradoodles being one of the brightest, most trainable dogs, and that is not just me saying that, it’s fact) would avoid cayenne pepper, as he begins to gracefully enter his senior years, he has been doing a few strange things. One of those things is eating the broadleaf weeds that poke through my neighbour’s fence and on the one hand, less weeds, but on the other, regurgitated weeds on the lawn. So I just don’t want to tempt fate and end up with a spicy pup.

But I am practicing non-attachment and will likely dig out the remainder of the tulips, and the next time I find myself in Costco tempted to purchase one hundred and thirty bulbs – which is how I found myself in this mess in the first place – will one of you remind me of the repeated catastrophe that is my yard and tulips? Please?

In the meantime everything else is coming along nicely – with the exception of my clematis, which is either late or dead, I’m not sure which. I’m HOPING it’s just late because last year it was a riot of purple, but we shall see.

So I will no longer fret over the tulips. I have bigger fish to fry! Like proving my husband wrong, in that there IS room for sixty-six more annuals in our perennial-heavy, kind of crowded flower beds.

Note to self: start digging out the lawn NOW.