Say "Hello" to Daisy the Dog. She's my roommate for the weekend and since the theme lately has revolved around summer, the old phrase "The Dog Days of Summer" come to mind. I imagine dogs laying around panting, paralyzed by the heat, and always related the saying to those suffocatingly hot days that wrap around you like a cocoon until relief can be found.

I was wrong.

The "dog days" of summer started with the ancient Greeks and Romans and refer to the time of year when the star Sirius, the brightest star in the sky, rose just prior to the sun. This is known as a heliacal rising where the star appears to be rising with the sun. This period lasted through July and August and the ancients related this time to heat, drought, plagues and madness. None of the said disasters are related to Sirius; the time frame in which the star rose just happened to coincide with one of the hottest times of the year. Most notably, the ancient Romans thought Sirius contributed to the heat of the sun due to it's brightness in the sky. (Remember, the ancient skies were not obscured by artificial light.)

As time goes by, the "dog days of summer" will become the "dog days of winter".  The Earth's rotation "wobbles", which shifts the position of the stars in the sky overtime. "Dog days" are now about 2 weeks behind the calendar date they were thousands of years ago and will fall in the middle of winter in about 10,000 years due to the rotational wobble.

On rare occasion, I walk around the corner and swim at the gym. I seem to encounter the gardener for the building across the street more often than not on my walk. I always say “Hello”, often commenting on his late hours. We occasional chat and over time I eventually get up enough nerve to ask him to be my gardener.
 
Nope.
 
I’m defeated like a lost lover but I’ll take my blows as they come.
 
I still say “Hello” when I see him.
 
One day I notice he’s in a walking boot which is a medical device to aid your ability to walk when a foot injury has occurred. We’ve built up enough of a “Hello” relationship that I walk over and check in on him. The discussion goes beyond gardening.
 
He then disappears for a long time.
 
I finally see him tonight and yell “Hi!” from across the driveway. He’s walking, with a slight limp, but walking and we meet to talk. He notices my front yard looks good and I explain that I fired the horrible guy I picked up “cheap” and found a new gardener who is overcharging (in my book) but doing a fabulous job so maybe isn’t overcharging? He asks if the new gardener has fertilized. I have no idea but it sparks a conversation about watering.
 
“Exactly how long and when do you water your lawn?”, I ask.

Suddenly I’m getting a tutorial on how to use my sprinkler control panel, which I know how to use BUT I don’t say anything because he’s GIVING. Next thing I know we are watching one of my sprinkler heads not rising, which the new gardener had also noticed, but did nothing about. He reaches down, tugs and voila!, it pops up and works. The new gardener would have charged me. Out of the kindness of his heart, my new friend from across the street helped out for free.
 
We simply never know where the next act of kindness will come from, even if it’s from our simply saying “Hello”.  When can you make 5 seconds to smile and say "Hello" to someone?

This year, I decided to grow corn. Yes, corn. In my backyard, nevertheless, and with no knowledge of what to do other than amend the soil, plant the seeds, water and pray. I hate to admit that I'm not the best gardener but there, I've just said it.  The corn has taken me by surprise though. It's not only growing, but it's following a certain growth pattern. It turns out the stalks and leaves have easily measurable growth rates that even a child could discern! Then again, the rest of my garden has been decimated by roly polys (who knew those cute little round balls could turn into your worst enemy?) so I actually think there may be some divine intervention at work. Either way, I've become fascinated by the growth cycle of the stalks as they mature, which in turn reminded me there are specific growth cycles that we can measure against most things in this world.

Pregnancy came to mind.

Welcome to my brain, it's kind of strange sometimes. 

My sister experienced pregnancy twice. As a result, I have a niece and nephew whom I'll be seeing next week for summer break. This is where gratitude arrives. I am so grateful for the two of them and the chance to spend time with them. When I ask people "What are you grateful for?", I usually get a blank stare and have to prompt them with some things they can be grateful for. It seems that most of us don't take enough time to think about the little things that make us happy, or the big ones, like pregnancy and the gift of life.

We could use the beginning of summer to set some new goals, but let's keep it easy today:

What are you grateful for? 

(I'm grateful my garage door was fixed today for less than the original quote, for the corn growing in my backyard, for my niece and nephew, for my sister who gave birth to those awesome kids, and for my colleague who pushes me to get off my butt and do "all the things"...)

Your turn!

Happy Summer of Gratitude! 

With niece and nephew, Kate & Ben, during the summer.

My calendar advised me that tomorrow is the first day of Summer. I sat in my office and cliched it "What have I done with my life this year?" 

Nothing came to mind. The phone rang. I moved on. 

But then I noticed the calendar again. And again. And yet again. Okay I'm game, what HAVE I done? At first, nothing came to mind. Looking back at January 1st I realized maybe I needed to give myself more credit:

• New Years Day: left a relationship where most of my needs were not being met.

(I love this guy, this is not easy.)

• Started this blog. 

(There are a million of them so how is this going to work?)

• Started writing a book.

(Where do I even start? How do you write a book?)

• Stopped thinking about saving money and looked at all of the unnecessary expenses.

(Yes wine is unnecessary and so are Odwalla chocolate protein shakes) 

• Finally completing all of the house items that have conveniently been ignored.

(Stop lying to yourself. The gutters won't last another rainy season and didn't make it through the last one.)

• Added more exercise to my weekly routine

(Surprisingly this is a perk of my week.)

If all of this seems like a lot then I can tell you it feels like a lot. My carefree life of freedom is now one of endless "keep going". The contradiction in the life of freedom vs one of progress is that the rewards are less than the life of progress. My fulfillment level has risen along with my self esteem. Admittedly I'm often lost in this new world with no clear end result in sight but the learning and rewards along the way have been phenomenal. 

​What have you done this year?