Lessons from the garden

I began gardening about 6 years ago. I was inspired by my next-door neighbor, who I have dubbed “The Master Gardener,” after I watched her garden grow and evolve for over 10 years. My gardening mentor warned me that I would soon get sucked in and become one of those crazy gardeners who spot a weed in one of their planting beds from their kitchen window and run outside in their robe and slippers to pull the offending weed from the ground. She was right. So, as I struggle to maintain my garden in the midst of the summer heat, over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing a few of the lessons my garden has taught me.

1)      Growth takes time, sweat, and love. What you put into it, is pretty much what you will get out of it.

After mostly gardening in containers for several years, I decided to dig a large planting bed in my backyard. I anticipated that this would be a huge undertaking but I had no idea how hard it would be. The sod in my backyard has grown undisturbed for over 40 years, and the grass has strong, deep roots. I did not rent a sod cutter because I was afraid that something would go horribly wrong, so I dug the entire 10 foot x 8 foot bed by hand. I did it during a week of my vacation and after hours of removing and hauling away sod, I would soak in a tub of hot water and douse myself in that green rubbing alcohol. The next morning I would wake up feeling great and go back to digging. After the digging came the planting, the watering, the fertilizing, and on and on. It never seems to end.

In much the same way as digging my garden bed, positive relationships, a successful career, and healthy, well-adjusted children take time, sweat and love. How many times have you witnessed a parent ignore, neglect or abuse their children and then shake their heads in disbelief when their children go astray. It pains me when I hear young mothers cursing at their children, call them names or tell them to “quit talkin’ to me.” These children’s tender spirits are often so bruised and crushed that the children become angry and bitter before they are old enough to articulate the pain that they are feeling. I’m the first person to admit that “I don’t know nuthin’ ‘bout birthin’ no babies” but I’ve worked with children for years and witnessed the horrible things that can happen if children do not get what they need from their caregivers. I could stick a plant in the ground and leave it up to mother nature to water it, and leave it to fend off insects and plant diseases on its own, and it may survive, but as what? A withered stump of a plant, barely distinguishable from the weeds that have nearly choked the life out of it? The schools, the streets and juvenile detention centers all over the country are full of children such as these. My prayer is that stressed out parents will receive the strength, the intestinal fortitude, and the support to give their children the attention that they need for them to grow.

More lessons to come. And hopefully a field trip. I’m excited!

Late Bloomer

I came to gardening, as I have come to many things, later in life. I have always admired people who have always known what they wanted to do when they grew up, or have latched onto a passion before they reached puberty and chased that passion until it became their craft. But as I reflect on the path that my life has taken, even though I didn't take a linear route, I believe that as I made my side trips, took a few detours, and yes, even hit a few dead ends, I learned something of value and each part of my journey has been a progression. As a social worker, working with people is a large part of what I do, but I first learned how to work with people as a cashier for a large supermarket chain. Before I decided to go to graduate school to study social work, I spent over 16 years working in corporate America, where I learned the importance of understanding the culture of an organization, whether it's a privately held insurance company or a family of four. So with gardening, which I started doing about 7 years ago, I got to apply everything I've learned about life in the concrete world to the kind of life that comes from the earth.

In graduate school, I learned about human development across the lifespan. After I started gardening, I started to think about our relationship with food across the lifespan, from the 3 year old, driving his parents to distraction with his picky eating habits, to the elderly man, whose taste buds, affected by the aging process and medication, don't allow him to savor food the way he did when he was younger. I started thinking about what food means to people, not just nutritionally, but socially and emotionally. I remember sitting in a large open office with a group of co-workers and listened to them trade stories of making sandwiches out of bread and mayonnaise because that was all the food that they had. But they laughed as they recalled those memories of lack, because they shared those memories with people that they loved. I remember talking with a friend, who has always had a poor appetite and stomach issues, as she told me how much anxiety she felt during mealtimes, when her fractured family would assemble together for the only thing they shared with each other, dinner.

I have always had a healthy appetite. I remember walking home from elementary school, before safety issues and shortened lunch periods, resulted in most public schools instituting a closed campus policy, to a lunch of cream of tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich, lovingly prepared by my mother, who sat me at the kitchen table and allowed me to watch a few minutes of Bozo's Circus before I had to dash back to school. From summer cookouts in the backyard to Thanksgiving dinners, I was willing and ready to eat my fill. But when I started gardening, my love for food deepened. I started to appreciate where food came from, what it could do to improve my health or widen my waistline. How food can go from a source of joy and pleasure, to a source of grief and frustration; when there isn't enough of  it, or when the body can't digest it, or appreciate it the way it used to. So I want to share my journey with food, how I went from consumer to producer. How my love for food increased when I put my fork down and picked up a shovel. How through gardening, I grew to love food. I hope you'll join me.