We all have our stubborn ways where we are so set in how we do things that changing is almost impossible. Poison ivy is teaching me this. I just don't like gardening with gloves on. Part of the enjoyment is the sensory pleasures of feeling the dirt crumble in your hands, knowing that you've grasped a weed well enough to get it up by the roots, and touching soft, cool living plants. Gloves diminish that enjoyment, sterilize the experience, and are cumbersome. It's like holding a newborn baby with rubber gloves on. You'd miss that incredibly soft skin.
So I've been dealing with a poison ivy rash for several weeks. There's no end in sight. And I'm still gardening without gloves on, encountering more poison ivy, and washing up to my elbows with poison ivy scrub whenever I know I've touched some. I don't have a problem with scratching the rash, and most of the time I can keep the itching down to a comfortable enough level. If the blisters weren't between my fingers I also think that they wouldn't burst.
My mother, who is in her eighties, told me recently that she gardens now with gloves on all the time. She could change. Maybe I can do this. But I think it is going to take a rash much worse than this one to change my mind.
2 comments:
Why change? As long as you prefer the feel of soil on your hands over the absence of a poison ivy rash, why should you wear gloves? It's not like there's a moral component to deciding whether or not to wear gloves while gardening...
I think it is the idea that perhaps I am being foolish in not taking enough precaution. However the rash I had is gone now, and so is the motivation to perhaps try to change...
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