Hanging over my head, teasing me, just out of reach. Tiny icky sticky ruby red omens dangling from their gangly mother waiting for their time to strike. Loitering with suspicious looks on their faces like graffiti artist looking for the opportunity to shake the can and do the work. If they could smoke cigarettes and snarl, they would.
The Heretomeles Arbutifolia, aka The Christmas Berry Tree was very popular in the 20s and 30s in Southern California and still has a pretty good ranking in the California Landscaping Hall of Fame. These “delightful” trees fruit during the winter and begin to dump ass loads of sticky red berries onto the ground for a few months in the beginning of every year. The house we currently live in, built in 1922, didn’t slip the punch of the Christmas Berry tree and we have a monster one right next to our walkway to the front door… and it’s a healthy one. So this means that everyday for the first few months of every year, I must sweep the walkway and steps, rain or shine. Everyday. Otherwise, we track these red explosive devices into the house sending everything we step on into the wash and most likely into the trash. Gotta sweep everyday.
During the first couple years of this forced labor, I realized that when I didn’t sweep the steps not only would we track red dye into the house but I felt something was lacking. Couldn’t really put my finger on what, but something was off. It felt as though my soul had a vitamin deficiency. The steps needed to be swept, period. The berries weren’t going to not fall and the longer I let them accumulate, the worse the job would be once I finally succumb to their crimson demands. Sometimes you just gotta sweep the steps. There’s no arguing with it. If you don’t, your path will become cluttered and harder to traverse. After years of this, I now sweep the steps and walkway everyday 365 days a year. I sweep as a reminder that there are some things in life that must happen no matter what. It smooths out the wrinkles of the mind. Discipline for discipline’s sake.
When we practice a task over and over with discipline, it eventually becomes a ceremony instead of a burden. We practice the discipline not necessarily the task itself. I’ve swept perfectly clean steps before. It’s in the actualization of the act that strengthens the muscles of discipline, not the job itself. It ain’t the dirt, it’s the sweeping. What do you need to do on the reg? What walkway do you need to keep sweeping in order to stay prepared for more fruit to fall?
