Sunday, August 24, 2008

How to Be Optimistic, well...

I am writing this article about "How to Be Optimistic" by addressing gratitude. I just want to say thanks to one of my stalkers, the "Hunky Gardener" because he did not think I looked my age. Having a young man give you a compliment like that really works wonders on your attitude. Hence the inspiration for the article...young men? Oops, I mean uhhh, gratitude!

The surest way I know to be optimistic is to have an attitude of gratitude. Yes, I am a Pollyanna, my glass is half full, well, at least most of the time. I love life, but like the clutter in my closet, it keeps me from fully living my passion. I never meet a stranger, though, I am strange, seems I just like to meet people, listen to them and become their friend. My friends are so random in age from 16 to 90 years old/young.

So how do you ...wait, sorry I lost my post again... this is getting to be a problem. I know I do not type that fast. As I was saying, I guess it is just in my genes, my DNA, the way God made me. It is how I cope, you know the expression "You fake it until you make it", well that is my mantra on most days. Eventually, I even believe it . Just amazing how an thankful attitude can improve your day.

Another coping skill I learned is to have a "happy place" that I can go to anytime I am stressed out or need to chill. For me, I am such a visual person that I can bring to life a bouquet of King Alfred daffodils and even smell them. Ahhhh, sweet memories of my Grandmother and the rows of daffodils, jonquils and narcissus. I eagerly go to that happy place for a pleasant moment and for the memories of a happier time in my life. I lay in between the rows of flowers and it was my heaven.

Another way I stay positive is to have PASSION in life for something that you can not live with out, excluding the husband, family, friends. You know something for you that just takes your breath away. I can't live without passion. My passion is flowers. I fell in love with antique roses when I was just a child thanks to my grandmother. When most kids would steal something from the five and dime store, I once stole daffodils from my Grandmother's neighbor's yard. Yep, I just stuck my greedy paw through the fence and picked the largest ones I saw. GM made me go with witherd jonquils in hand back to her neighbor, apologize, and promise to never do it again.

While most kids got into trouble with ordinary kid stuff, I got into trouble with flowers. I did do my fair share of fighting bc I was a tomboy, but I also took my Grandmother's expensive dusting powder and thought I was fertilizing her flowers. I got in so much trouble. And that was the end of fancy dusting powder, never really cared much for that stinkin stuff any way. But she planted the seeds in my heart for flowers. My favorite flower is the Peony, double petaled, in hot pink and pale pink and that smell, just intoxicating...like nothing I have ever smelled before.

I thank my grandmother for her love of flowers and gardening bc she passed that on to me. I have been a florist, gardener, artist all my life. Even though my new flower beds died from this Texas heat. Growers just don't know what west exposure in Texas is like. There should be a new category for this kind of unbreathable and suffocating heat. Not fit for man nor beast, nor plants, you take your life in your own hands to garden in this heat. My flower beds are the proof of that!


Wow, I really did get sidetracked. Sorry if you can't follow. I think you get my gist. I will try to do better next time. Thanks for reading. Until, my next post. Pam

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