Planting flowers.

Small things help.

As my stalkers know, Debbie and I are planting some flower seeds tomorrow. If she picks Marigolds, they take roughly 12 weeks to flower. If she picks Stock Cinderella, well then, according to the instructions they're a lot more difficult to grow and the packet doesn't say how long between planting and flowering. It's most likely that we'll plant Marigolds . . . as that was the flower we both thought of.

Anyway, the story of the cup.
I was very distressed during one of our sessions once, and looking all around the room to avoid eye contact and also because distress makes me feel quite flighty. Then I noticed this cup on the window sill. The thing is, it's a ceramic mug, not a polystyrene or paper cup, which indicates that either it was used by one of the staff, or someone brought their own mug. I think the former.

Part of the thing with being an ICT client, is that ICT staff don't have offices on the level of the building where clients are met. (It's a two level building.) That means that basically, ICT jumps in and uses the Manukau Team's empty rooms. The room that Debbie and I are in most, is room 6. It has doors, so I can see outside into the car park that has most of the company fleet. It has a window, which has vertical blinds. There is a whiteboard. A round table. Chairs. And for some reason, a sofa. There's also a telephone. The window and the door are north-facing, meaning they get the sunlight most of the day . . . and occasionally I get sun in my eye, if Debbie's sitting on certain angles.

That also means that there are a lot of people who use room 6.
A few weeks later, I noticed that the cup was still there. I had a look in it, and it just has a brown ring at the bottom from what I assume is tea. It's still there. Of all the people that use room 6, nobody has removed the cup. Myself and Debbie have commented on it - only within our sessions - and it's become a sort of a running thing. The cup is constant.

I've been thinking for a while that I'd like to do something interesting with the cup, see how long it takes somebody to notice. I also thought it might be really nice to grow some flowers, because a lot of people that go into that room are not in a good space . . . and flowers are pretty, after all.

So on Thursday when I had an extra session with Debbie, I suggested growing a flower in the cup. And she liked the idea. We were thinking about flowers and she said she likes Marigolds. I like Marigolds, too. They're bright. We came to the conclusion that I would get some seeds, and she would bring some potting mix. She said she thinks she has some at home, but failing that, she can always ask Christina, one of the ICT OTs, who happens to run the gardening group. And watering is simple - just needs one of us to get a cup of water on the way to our session.

Basically, I've been really looking forward to planting these flowers. We're going to see how long it takes others to notice what is happening in the cup (because we decided it would be fun to not tell anybody else), and for me, the growth is kind of . . . symbolic. I'm at a point where things are really hard, and I'm really low, yet I'm still making progress - which is huge.

So I'm gonna watch that motherfucker grow all pretty and colourful and feel good about it, because I get to do something fun and kind of (I don't know the word for it but that emoticon is perfect) with my psychologist, and growing flowers sneakily in a neglected cup is the most fun secret I've had in a very long time.

So we're planting flowers. And it's a small thing but it's also a big thing, because I've been looking forward to it, and just this small thing has been a huge part of how I've been getting through this weekend.