Suddenly

It has been like more than a month since I stopped blogging due to changes in schedules, extra work load, some out of town seminars and a favorite sister getting married. How I wish those trips were for leisure. Even if I was not blogging, I never left the garden. How I miss the blogs of my fellow gardeners. 

A Japanese-style garden with a soothing koi pond of a hotel.

A huge vase in the hotel lobby. 

My work assignment in the operating room made me choose to set aside blogging for the time being due to the erratic schedule.

Suddenly, my day became the night and my night turned into day.... 

and the metamorphosis has begun.

Swallowtail caterpillar

What used to be backbreaking affair in my garden became long hours of leg-aching sessions in the operating room. There was a time when little spiders were common sight in the garden. Now, spider veins are the last thing one would want to see in the legs which may possibly occur from prolonged standing and from restricted movements. Thanks to Conrad Jobst who invented the compression hosiery. With that, varicosis can be prevented and  long periods of standing becomes comfortable and easy.

I was told this plant is called variegated papua but when I googled it, I can't seem to find its name.

Suddenly, the glare of the sun was transformed into the glow of the surgical lights in the theater. I did not mind getting dirty at all in the garden. Now, scrubbing to keep the hands and arms as clean as possible is a protocol and keeping asceptic field in the OR area is all that matters. Garden gloves turned out to be surgical gloves. The greens surrounding the garden came to be the green drapes and gowns. Pruning shear and secateurs, shovels, hand hoe, garden hose were made into the surgical scissors and bone shear, retractors, tubes and catheters. 

My Pleomele reflexa with volunteer coleus

Basically, time plays a vital role in the OR. In the garden time passes by unhurriedly, calmly.

Chocolate ti plant

Life in the OR contrary to the time in my garden... I can have both worlds, I can't complain. As Albert Einstein said, life is like riding a bicycle; to keep your balance you must keep moving.