Weeds

Colorado has been unseasonably cool and rainy this summer. It's a good thing overall - we often have watering restrictions. It's good for the weeds too. For the past five years or so, we've had a bumper crop of weeds. This year I finally surrendered and called a landscaper. He took a look and said "Round-Up!" I explained we tried that - twice. We also tried planting other things (the weeds won) and even a blow torch. But the weeds are back...again.

Another landscaper has suggested pulling them out by their roots, so instead of mowing, we're pulling. The problem is that they're growing faster than we can pull! We have some that look like sequoias.

And so we have resolved to pull the tallest ones and just mow the rest. The other alternative involves a back hoe, a team of highly skilled professional xeriscapers and a tag team of laborers working 24/7 for weeks if not months.

But this whole thing got me thinking...we work so hard against our natural tendencies. My yard's natural tendency is to grow weeds and I'm fighting it. In that case I probably should.

But what about us? If we have straight hair, we curl it. If it's curly, we straighten it. If we're fat, we beat on ourselves - but the same thing happens if we're thin. We can always find a reason not to accept ourselves. And we spend so much time, money, energy and resources on fighting against our genes!

Yesterday Farrah Fawcett passed away. I watched the documentary she made and as she lost her hair, her skin darkened to an ashen color and her body bloated she never whined about it. She had been arguably one of the most beautiful women on the planet and that was all fading away quickly as the cancer invaded her body. But she had such a clear sense of what was important - being alive, being loved and loving right back, fighting for what's right and a sense of humor and altruism.

Thank you Farrah - wherever you are - for this final lesson. Accept yourself but not only that - embrace yourself. Don't throw away valuable time trying to change who you are. I attended a talk recently and the speaker quoted a poem. I loved it, but didn't catch the author. He said, "I dreamed I was a great ocean that was jealous of a pond."

Instead of picking out all your flaws and ruminating on them, ruminate on all your fantastic qualities - share them with the world. Feel free to admire others, but recognize your own gifts too.

As Antoine Saint Exupery said "What is essential is invisible to the eye."