Green

So I'm thinking green for obvious reasons (and for those who are not in America or Ireland and the reasons are not obvious, today is St. Patricks day whereupon everyone with the slightest drop of Irish blood in their lineage embraces their "Irish heritage" and goes out to get a celtic knot tattoo and drinks a bunch of green beer (as though beer was not gross enough in its amber form) and eats disgusting things such as corned beef and cabbage. Doesn't that just sound revolting? Yes it does. Also pretty much everyone wears green. Even me. But mostly because I enjoy wearing green so heck, why not?

Anyway so, green- really quite an emotive colour isn't it? Breaking it down, as I tend to do:

The Positive Connotations:
Spring, rebirth, nature, conservation, money
The Negative Connotations:
Feeling pukey or jealous or so jealous you could puke.
So here's what I have to say about each of these things:
Spring. I have a real appreciation for it now that I live in a place with such a long and trying winter. Spring brings true euphoria, people come out of their houses and start smiling again. You realise that you do indeed have neighbours. And the flowers! The flowers of spring are by far the most beautiful in my opinion. I love them all...(I am enjoying some daffodils on my mantle this week, although they have yet to grow in my flower beds)


but I particularly love tulips, they remind me of my wedding day. The week before we were to be married, we stopped by Temple Square (where the beauty and variety of tulips are legendary) and saw the gardeners starting to pull out the tulips that I had been dreaming of being in my wedding photos! They were still beautiful and very much alive, but they do not allow anything to look "on its way out" on Temple square, so they were being pre-emptively euthanized. I was distraught and beseeched the groundsmen to hold out for just one more week. And I'm sure that my request went all the way up to the First Presidency, because on my wedding day, there were plenty of tulips (although you can see the freshly cleared beds behind us)

Now I eagerly await my tulips each year and after they arrive I wait in great angst for news of an impending freeze, whereupon I obsess over whether to cut them all and bring them indoors to enjoy, or take my chances. In the past, I have gone the cutting route and then watched as my neighbour's tulips continued to grow happily, so this year, I am going to be bold and leave the poor little things out in the cold.


Photos of past rescue efforts:





Rebirth Spring and Easter obviously go together (if you are in the Northern hemisphere that is)which does seem appropriate. A time for joy,gratitude and new beginnings. It is a good time to be re-energized spiritually. I will be finished with my current reading of the Book of Mormon on May 10th and have found it to be a particularly wonderful experience this time around. It is just an amazing, amazing book.
Nature. I am so excited to be able to start running outdoors again. It is a totally different experience from the treadmill and really gives you a holistic workout. There is something extremely...cleansing? about running on the actual earth. It just gives you a feeling of connectedness to...well..everything. It's good. It's really good.
Conservation-Covered this quite a bit yesterday but something I am increasingly interested in so that my kids and grandkids can also enjoy running outside and have the out of body experience of being in a place where it at least feels like nobody has ever been before. It gives you a sense of perspective and awe like nothing else can. I have a long way to go, but I hope to improve in my conservation efforts all the time.
Money Not sure why I put this in the positive connotations as it is generally holds negative connotations for me. Money is a source of rather a lot of stress for me. I wish I had more, I wish I managed it better, although I often wonder how much would be too much. If I had a bunch more than I strictly needed, I imagine I would feel really guilty about that, and wonder who I should be giving it to, and then I would wonder how much was enough for me to keep before I should start giving it away. I mean really technically, one could live in a shack, buy just enough food to get by and give away all the rest for the survival of others. So I technically have much more then enough already. I say my house is too small, but really is it? Is it too small to house the 6 of us warmly and safely? No. Does it fulfill its functions? Yes. (And as aside, I have to say since getting rid of the forest worth of paper in here it feels a lot more accomodating. Even though the forest was somewhat neatly concealed in drawers and cabinets, it just feels bigger knowing that it is gone.) Anyway back to money. It would be nice to have enough not to have to worry or even think about it, although again, in the scheme of things, I am incredibly fortunate and want for nothing, so why is it that I am worrying about it again? Oh right, it is all those people whining to be paid all the time! Thaaat. Also I really would enjoy being able to give it away whenever I liked, that would be a huge high, and I find it hard to imagine why super rich people don't sell a few of their homes and do that all the time rather then just on TV. Cough Oprah. Cough.

Anyway, putting it in the positive category is a step in the right direction. Right? If you going to get new agey about it, this should attract more of it to me. Or something.

Feeling pukey- A sensation I dread above all other. Really is there anything worse? Give me pain anyday. This was always my greatest hang-up about pregnancy and childbirth. I would probably have more children if it weren't for nausea. So I guess it can serve its purpose.

Feeling jealous-An emotion I greatly fear. Is there anything uglier?Its torturous. It makes you feel bad about whomever you are jealous of, and even worse about yourself for feeling that way. It messes with your perspective and consumes you. It destroys relationships. It eats you from inside. It makes you supremely unattractive. It is just an ugly, ugly thing. It is a goal of mine to conquer that emotion completely. Another great aspect of aging is that it definitely seems to mellow out the green eyed monster.

So what are your thoughts on these green matters? Tell me what the green means to you.

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