Exceptional Contest Entry: A Slice of My Life Moments Such As These by Mrs. KT True Story Contest contest entry

Those who know me well, know that my husband and I have been happily married for nearly thirty-nine years. The union of a structural engineer and an English teacher. A pragmatist and a romantic. "Everything in its rightful place" versus “Creative clutter.” It is a friendship and marriage that has worked blessedly, joyfully, and with little to no “hiccups” for nearly four decades. And for all these many years, wherever we have lived, our yards have been teeming with gardens that my husband and I have created and nurtured with a great deal of perseverance and help from Mother Nature. In fact, our yard for the past twenty-eight years lacks a lawn of any substance but displays an abundance of perennial gardens.  Wild and wooly perennial gardens. And pots. Striking cobalt blue ceramic pots, of all shapes and sizes, overflow with equally beautiful groupings of assorted annuals I spend weeks collectng, sorting, and protecting from unexpected frost. I lovingly design the floral gatherings every spring and place them in their shiny blue pots among the perennial beds and along the mulched pathways of our world. Now, my best friend loves our gardens, but he's not too fond of the pots. In fact, he has even been known, on occasion, to refer to them as "trinkets." Trinkets that he believes detract from the overall beauty of the gardens. Trinkets that he contends make our yard look like a cemetery, or worse…a putty golf course. During the autumn of 2015, as I was recovering from my second knee replacement, I was unable to help my husband as he  “put the gardens to sleep.” He alone emptied and dismantled all the pots and stored them away for the winter. It was no easy task, and our northern Michigan weather was less than perfect: bitterly cold, blustery, and raining. This year's October undertaking was a completely different scenario: the sun was shining, the temperature was mild, and I was present to assist and "guide" the operation. Three hours after we began, we had emptied all the ceramic pots and hauled their contents to our compost pile. It was then that I cheerfully suggested to my husband that this year we need not store all the pots under the deck where he had placed everything the previous year. Although I am quite nimble these days, it still was painfully difficult for me to walk down our steep hillside embankments, crawl under the deck, and haul my garden treasures out from under said enclosure this past spring. “Oh, really?” my dear husband queried when he had digested my proposal. “Sure,” I replied. “We just need to turn them over, and place them in protected areas, and they’ll be fine. Trust me. Even the seven birdbaths will be fine. Promise.” “But everyone can see that there are overturned pots in our yard. There’s so many of them!  They will be more than a little visible!” “No one is even going to care. I am quite certain no one is going to drive by and exclaim, “‘Oh! Look! Trueloves have upside down pots in their yard!’” “What about all those "trinkets" on the deck?” “Same deal. We just need to empty everything, and I’ll tuck them under the benches and place some protective coverings over them. And then next spring, I won’t have to trouble you to get them from under the deck, and I won’t wrench my back or experience that “lovely” sensation of crawling on my bionic knees in the dirt.” “Won’t the pots leave rings on the deck?” “Oh, they might. But when you power wash the deck in the spring, the rings will disappear.” “Boy. You never give a guy a break, do you?” “But look!” I laughed, perhaps a bit too enthusiastically, “I’ve saved you all sorts of time because no one will need to unearth the pots from under the deck, and you won't worry that I have rolled unceremoniously down the hillside and into the woods on my way to retrieve them!" Shaking his head, my husband left to retrieve the leaf blower so that I could tidy up the deck. When he returned, I was standing by the railing and viewing the vista of our backyard.   My husband set the leaf blower down and joined me at the railing. “Everything looks so bare now,” I wistfully remarked. “Yup. No more flowers. Just a lot of upside down blue pots,” my husband all too quickly responded. “Well, I for one love putting the gardens to sleep. It tells the world that one season is over, and a new one is beginning.” “If you ask me, it tells the world we own a hell of a lot of blue pots.” "Do you really dislike my blue pots as much as you let on?"  "No. Not really. But with my luck, they'll exponentially multiply over the winter." Without looking at one another, we both started laughing.  The kind of good-natured, unbridled laughing that only best friends of four decades would understand.  And once again, I was reminded why I dearly love this man who has put up with all my idiosyncrasies, gardening schemes, and countless blue pots, for all these many years...     Recognized Author Notes Please note: Fragments are intentional.

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