I am back home for a weekend. I am back to purge the un-needed and fix the broken and play PIBWIB. (put it back where it belongs). I have run out of clean clothes in less than 48 hours. So I had to decend the steps into the dark belly of the house.

I have never liked the narrow laundry room. The adjoining darkest corner room houses boxes from Rose’s college apartment. Kitchen supplies, linens and furniture for a future on-hold. I won’t share a photo of that mess.

I went to my shop which still has the big plants I could not move out on my last visit. I needed a short piece of chain to repair a hanging solar light beside the entrance to the pebble patio with no furniture and a few weeds. No photo.

I save scraps of anything that might be useful later,  thus there are many junk drawers and boxes of craft supplies. I knew just where to find scrap chain and wire. I will not share photos of that untidy chaos either.

I have done hours of trimming in the gardens. I left piles for Mr. Flower to haul to the gully. The beds look neater…for now. No before photos will make the blog. Only staged after pictures. The whole truth never makes the cut. Only the successes. Is this misleading?

I will share only the lovely scenes. You will see only the bright blooms and thriving plants. No one cares to see the weeds and debris in piles. No one wants to witness the ugly part of gardening…and life.

Is leaving out the whole truth a lie? Is omission really a sin?

That’s where my head is right now, after abandoning my writing project. The research I spent months doing uncovered the reality of squabbles and sadness and elopements and a suicide that were never shared.

The unpretty pasts of folks I never met. The  keeping of their secrets is a bit haunting. That’s what I was thinking about as I preened my gardens to make them pristine and picture-worthy. Only share what is presentable and hide the rest.

We all want our best selves to be seen and remembered. It’s only natural. What would be gained by exposing the ugly? They took things to their graves for their own reasons.

Tidying up their lives to make them presentable was like me cleaning up a flower bed for a photo shoot.  Somethings are best left unsaid and unseen…and yet.

FLOW