It was two years ago yesterday that precious Arnie died.  That’s basically when I decided as that beautiful dog had lived for love, and was willing to give it all for his mom, I felt I had to honour his memory by following my heart.  I owe so much to that dog!

But due to the high cost of divorce, it’s taken me until now to be able to fully appreciate the things I and I alone can decide to do in the house and yard.  I tell ya, it’s a heady feeling.  The only downer is Nicky.  He continues to flap his gums, and interfere in things that have absolutely nothing to do with him.

I was so thrilled when Lisa Masini of Waterwise Landscape Design came over on Wednesday.  She spent over an hour here, and we decided we’re starting with the lower lawn.  All of it will be removed, and I have to take out every perennial!  I e mailed my sister-in-law Wendy who’s a gardening freak, and even she replied, “So are we crazy, or what??”

She’s watched me put all of the beds in over the past 22 years, and provided me with the phlox that I have throughout my garden.  She and Freddie just bought a house which is on two acres, so I said to her, “Please take some of your phlox back home to the Coast from whence it came.”  Wendy really likes that idea, and so do I.

This will engender a trip from Maple Ridge to Kelowna, to dig out dozens of clumps of heliopsis and phlox, and transport them back to the Coast to re-plant.  But we’re true gardeners, so we both shrug, and say, “What’s so impractical about that?”

Lisa’s then going to have bark mulch and pea gravel brought in, and will make nice paths and hillocks.  Then she said we’ll call in an irrigation company, and get this, I won’t be watering the flower beds by hand anymore!

Nicky was nattering the whole time about how long this would take, and what it’ll look like, and so on.  I just kept saying, “What’s the difference?  It’s what I want and I’m doing it.”  Once Lisa’s filled the hillocks with gorgeous self-spreading indigenous plants, he’ll forget all about the useless lawn.

I’ve similarly gone mad inside the house.  I bought a new couch, and now decided I need the matching chair.  I love the look of rattan, and as I have lots of plants and windows, it kind of makes sense in my living room.  Plus, the reality is that any fabric couch will be turned into rags by Wrecks within months.

Because the living room looks so different without the old sectional, the new couch started a domino effect of furniture-moving.  It’s been going on for the past two days, but I think I have the place under control.  But it’s been so much fun that yesterday morning I felt so giddy with excitement I wondered if Nicky’d slipped some mushrooms into my cereal.

But it turned out he hadn’t, and I’m just going to have to learn to live with very high levels of euphoria.  I suppose there could be worse things.