Digging in the dirt. Planting seeds. Weeding. Pruning. Planning. Dreaming. Nurturing. Admiring.
Out there is where I lose myself and my worries and concerns for hours at a time. Even a few minutes out there enables me to shift my thinking or alter my mood. And sometimes even solve a problem. I can be stuck on a project – wring my hands on it for hours – totally stuck. And then go into the garden and a solution appears. Just like that.
Speaking of being stuck. That’s another good thing about working in the garden – seeing immediate progress. True – the result of planting seeds or bulbs doesn’t show up for a while. Those will surprise and delight in a few months. But today – the result of pruning and mulching – the pile of brush at the street and the nice neat beds around the house – very satisfying.
And then there are built in benefits – good doses of vitamin D and often a good work out too.
It’s also a very convenient and flexible hobby – delivering rewards no matter how much time there is to devote to it.
From the time I was 9, I remember my mother spending hours in the garden.
Once out of school, I planted a few bulbs right outside the door of my condo. Blue iris. Pale yellow gladioli. Low on demand. High on forgiveness. Lovely greeters whenever I came home – no matter how long I had been away.
Six years later, I complicated my already demanding work and travel schedule by getting married and choosing to live 45 minutes away from my office. And then became a Mom.
I ignored frequent tugs to get outdoors in the dirt until Ryan turned two. Struggling with all sorts of issues including the death of my mother, I had a personal planning retreat with myself and plowed through my wish list, weeding out the less important things. Planting flowers was still up near the top.
So I MADE time for it. Ryan and I did it together. We unloaded the flowers from the car into his little red wagon and pulled it around to the front of the house where we planted a small bed of annuals. Pansies in the fall and vinca in the spring.
Ah – digging in the dirt! I loved it and so did he. And then we got to enjoy the beauty every single time we drove up the driveway.
A few years later, we moved to a home with well established gardens – so a bed of annuals was all that was needed. By then, Ryan was 7 and had aged out of his interest in planting flowers with his mother. But it was still a great thing for me to do while he played outdoors.
When we moved again, this time to new construction, I stood on the front porch in tears. Overwhelmed by what seemed like miles of brown mulch, my husband said the most wonderful thing, “Sweetie – just pretend it’s a blank canvas.” Just the perfect thing to say.
It’s been six years now and the canvas is no longer blank. With the help of many people, we’ve planted shrubs and trees and annuals and perennials and groundcovers. We even built a rock stair case! Now that was a good work out!
There is still much work to do. I go out every day and enjoy the new sprouts or buds or whatever is new. For a few minutes. Or hours. Totally lost in a totally different world. Away from the silence of a teenager sequestered in his room.
Hmmm – maybe that’s why Mom spent so much time out there.
Speaking of teens – our way below freezing temperatures are making it it hard to go out for long. But birds of all kinds are coming to visit – more than I remember in the past – to enjoy the berries and seeds and hiding places our gardens provide. Another good reason to garden.
What about you…why do you garden?