Here We Go Again?

Every spring, I am SO eager to mow the grass.

During the winter, Rich services the mowers — fresh oil, sharp blades, blow off all the leftover clippings, the works — so when we pull the mowers out of the shed (yes, there’s more than one mower around here 🤦‍♀️), it feels a bit ceremonial.

The air is still cool, and the trees are just beginning to leaf out in that bright lime color. The grass has somehow turned green almost overnight, and cutting it feels more like a celebration than a chore.

Spring is here. WOO HOO! The earth is alive again.

Together we embark on MOWING #1 for the year!!

By this time in the summer — and mowing 14, 15, or 16 — my enthusiasm has…faded somewhat.

The grass is still growing, and so are the blasted weeds. The edges need trimming. The flower beds need pulling. The tiny volunteer mimosa tree seedlings need to be dealt with.

The humidity is just shy of us needing gills while we’re outside working, but somehow the mower still manages to throw dust into the air. In no time I’m a sweaty, sticky mess, and as I go back and forth on the mower, I find myself fantasizing about a small drought.

Nothing serious — just enough to slow things down.

The last time I mowed the grass, I thought about how lovely it would be to have a week or two without needing to mow.

And the real reason I wished for less growth? Because I was tired of tending it.

I do this in other parts of my life, too.

How often do I ask to have life and have it more abundantly…and then kvetch about the work — the washing and drying, the cooking and cleaning — required to care for it?

For a long time, I treated recurring work as though it were somehow inferior to work that could be completed. Finished work gave me satisfaction. Recurring work made me feel behind.

Until I realized recurring work isn’t proof I’m failing to get ahead, it’s evidence I’ve been given something worth tending.

The temporary nature of recurring work doesn’t make the work meaningless. The work that returns might be some of the holiest work we will ever do because the work of tending is about relationship, even if that faithfulness seems to leave no permanent evidence.

This about it. This week the marigolds are flourishing and need only regular drinks of water, but next week? They might not need any water because they received more than enough rain, but they might need deadheading so they can put all their energy into growing new blooms. I will sprinkle those deadheaded seeds on the ground so they can be ready for a new season next year.

Are the people in our lives so very different?

Perhaps that is what ordinary life and ordinary times teach us? Growth isn’t always exciting, and faithfulness isn’t always inspiring. Sometimes spiritual maturity looks like embracing the way the meaningful parts of life require repetition.

Pray…again.

Be patient…again.

Show kindness…again.

Pay attention again.

It’s all about mowing the grass…again.

A Question: What recurring work in your life have you begun to resent simply because it never stays finished?

An Invitation: This week, choose one returning task and consciously approach it differently. Don’t pretending to enjoy it. Don’t rush through it willy-nilly. Simply pause long enough to notice what the task is tending.

The work may return next week (okay, tomorrow) — it probably will. But perhaps the returning work is not a failure to reach the finish line, it’s the rhythm of being alive.

With you in the growing,