Turning 30.

Sometimes our path is so wrought with thorns and seemingly insurmountable boulders that it isn’t until we’re running wildly through fields of color untethered and senses satisfied, that the realization hits us: I’m here.  The heartaches, tears, countless nights without sleep plagued by questions…meeting these things and wrestling with them chisels us not just to a place where you’re ready to face the next battle but to a place where you awake one morning and realize to the depth of your being that you’re a different person than you were a decade ago.  That the person you wanted to be and cried for because you weren’t there and seemingly never would is now here.  That the first third of your life doesn’t have to be gone but that chapter officially closes and now the next third – maybe the most significant third, the adult third, can be made by love-filled choices instead of fearful reactions.  This is what turning 30 is to me.

Artistic Genius

My surroundings have always been really important to me.  I appreciate beauty and love things that tell a story to the keen eye and listening ear.  My home is no different and is decorated with things and mementos that are important to me and remind me of people, particular times in my life, and things I want to be reminded of.  They are subtleties that are easy to miss and can be mistaken as mere decoration. 

I love plants – having them around makes me automatically feel like I’ve inserted an extra bit of health into my home.  I love the symbiotic relationship that exists.  My breath puts toxins into the air that nurtures the plants and in turn they provide oxygen so that I may breathe.  It’s one of the brilliant things about nature and I love the cyclical relationship between animals and plants.  I say all this because my plants are important to me and even they have stories behind them.

My most special plant is an Impatiens plant.  I was given this plant during a time when my life was significantly altered as a result of horrendous external circumstances.  People who know me know I’m not very good at being patient and this time in my life I was no different.  I wanted to jump through the process and get to the other side.  I couldn’t have made it through this time without my best friend who would lovingly tease me about how poorly patient I am, or impatient.  It is my friend who gave me this plant – a beautiful plant with pink flowers – to remind me that even an “impatient” plant can bloom, flourish, and be beautiful.  No matter the external situations, given the right nourishment and love, flowers can appear and growth will happen.  In fact, even as a direct result of hardships and trials these flowers come.  And over time, I’ve loved that the stalks haven’t grown perfectly and that it started looking a little bit hod-podged.  There is beauty within the messiness and I love my Impatiens plant.

Lately my Impatiens hasn’t been looking very happy so I decided it was time for a professional to step in.  I wish I would have taken a before photo to show the wreckage, but this morning I decided to take my little plant to a nursery and see if they could help.  As I walked up, a man stopped walking in his tracks and exclaimed, “That’s an Impatiens plant!”  I couldn’t believe he knew and quickly recognized he must work there.  I could barely get the words out of my mouth about why I was there before he whisked the plant out of my hands and to my horror started ripping the plant apart.  I asked if it was dead and had no hope and he exclaimed that this plant needs to be outside!  At this point I was both impressed and bemused – impressed that he knew I had been keeping the plant inside yet annoyed he had just ripped 2/3 of it off!

He started muttering and walked away holding my plant and I quietly followed not entirely sure what to do.  He proceeded to pour a LOT of water on it followed by an exclamation about my pot not draining properly.  Again, I didn’t have much words but said something about not knowing.  He sighed, took the plant out, put his mouth to where the drain is and started blowing.  At this point all I could do was stand back in awe.  Here was a man who didn’t know me, who I had hardly said 3 sentences to, and he was touching my plant and putting his mouth to the pot.  What I first saw as a quirky old man quickly shifted to an appreciation for an encounter with an artist, a man who loves plants, who truly desires for them to be alive and to flourish.  Like a musician who must run to his instrument as soon as a song comes to mind, this man had something inside of him intrinsically pushing him to make sure this plant didn’t leave his presence without having the proper care. 

I’ve read quite a bit this year about artistic passion and how this love translates into absolute genius.  This morning I encountered a man who is absolutely in his element and I couldn’t help but stand back with appreciation and think of one of my favorite quotes, listed at the top of my blog, “Find what you love and let it kill you.”

It is this kind of love, this kind of intensity that takes the ho-hum artist to the genius artist.  We all have an artist in us and we all have a genius. 

Thank you to this man who mended my sweet Impatiens plant and who further inspired me to deepen my passions without fear of what that might look like.  Because, in the end the deepest passions are the most incredible and the ‘crazy’, the most beautiful.  

My Impatiens plant - now outside and about 1/3 of its pre-artist size encounter.