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May 08, 2005
Lessons in Gardening
I love to garden...OK....that's an understatement.
I started to grow a few flowers just because I like flowers in the house and I didn't want to pay the outrageous prices for a bundle of flowers at the grocery store. Since that time my passion for gardening and my need to create my own special sanctuary has grown.
I've spent the better part of the last few months getting the clean up done. The flower beds look very bleak at this time of year. Here's a couple of the beds in the back yard.
Each spring I need to get the dead annuals pulled out. Trim back the dead stalks of the Shasta's , Black-Eyed Susan's, Praire Sun Flowers and the Yarrow....and of course dig out a few more weeds. The battle over weeds is never ending....though a few are allowed to survive in my flower beds if they are striking and don't cause me too much headache. One must learn to co-exist, even with weeds.
As always gardening is my thinking time. I get a bit philosophical about my gardening and have noticed some common things between gardening and life in general.
Planning: Mine starts in January. I pour over seed and plant catalogs. I do a layout of how I want each flower bed to look. What types of flowers...when do they bloom. What colors and textures do I want to put together. The new flowers I want to try have to be worked into the perennials that are already there.
It always helps to have a plan.
Preparation: About March when the weather breaks it's time for me to spend a few weeks getting the flower beds ready. Cleanup. and then I've got to till in thge Manure and Peat. Weed control. The perennials have to be checked and thinned. The annuals coming back from seed must be thinned also. There is such a thing as too much of a good thing.
The work is physical and I spend the first few days nursing aching muscles and back. I start to build callus on hands grown soft in the winter and from here until fall I will constantly have a dozen nicks, scratches and cuts all over them at any one time and I can never seem to get all the dirt out from underneath my nails. But it's all good. It's some of the best exercise you can get. I benefit. The plants will benefit.
To get good results you have to put in the work.
Planting: The reward for all that hard work preparing is the next step. Planting seeds and new plants started from seed chosen from those catalogs back in January.
I take over the garage. We've closed it in and it's supposed to become a game room...but that's another story. Anyway seed trays and Jiffy cups can be found everywhere. The windows glow from the grow lights. I nurse these little seedlings, coaxing them to grow.
One of the most important steps with seedlings is letting them harden off. They need to slowly get use to the environment outdoors with it's strong sun, sometimes hard winds and the changes of temperature.
The preparation and the planting is the time to give these plants the best start possible. After they are in the flower beds, they will have to put down their roots and do their thing.
I guess that's kinda like kids. We have to give them the best start possible, but there comes a time when they have to grow on their own. Something I need to be reminded of lately.
Adversity: Ah...adversity....the biggie.
We live on a low ridge between the Allegheny and the Blue Ridge mountain ranges. We're prone to high winds that rush down off the mountains to the west. This wind pattern also seems to cause the summer thunderheads to pass over us and collect on the eastern range. Many times the sun shines in my yard and I can watch the rain to the east. We live on a well and when it's very dry I can't waste water on flowers...of course that's what my husband says...until I threaten to rip out every plant instead of seeing them wither away...at which point the hose comes out.
We also can get the other side. Heavy rains and strong winds that beat the plants down. Ripping the leaves off, breaking stalks.
Late spring frosts have taken a few hits. Each spring as the perennials start to come out of dormancy, I find I've lost a few to winter kill.
The dogs are no help either. They do their fair share of digging and tromping through the beds. I try to co-exist with them. I've learned not to plant anything in what they consider their short-cuts through the flower beds. At least I know where to put the stepping stones. This year we have the addition of my daughter's 7 month old puppy. He hasn't learned that plants are suppose to stay in the ground. Reminds me when one of the older dogs was young. She seem to feel the pond looked better without the pond plants.
Bugs and weeds are a constant. Sometimes I win over them. Sometimes they win over me. Last year I found the Japanese Beetles had dined on every single one of my Aster blooms overnight. It was a sad sight. Nothing to do, but pull them out and find something to replace the hole left by them.
Adversity is part of gardening and you learned to deal with it. Make compromises. Be flexible and change plans mid-way sometimes....such as with life.
People ask me why I bother. It's a lot of work. I say it isn't work when you love doing it. I love the connection to nature...to the earth.
On days when the breeze is blowing gently, and the sun is shinning down on my back. The mountains are crystal clear and the sky a vivid blue I can't think of another place I rather be. With my MP3 player cranked, digging in the warm earth, watching my garden transform.
It's on these types of days when I feel so connected to the universe, that all feels right in my world. There are no problems to great. There are solutions to every challenge. I only feel peace, happiness, fulfillment. On these days I dance in my garden. Yes, I dance. I swirl, pirot and skip. I'm sure my neightbors wonder about my crazy behavior, but I don't really care. I have to dance. I feel so alive, so connected to other life that I have to express the pure exhilaration I feel, in me and around me. I celebrate life!
This is where my passion from gardening comes from. The end result. It is for this very reason I do the planning, preparation, planting and deal with the adversity. Because the end result is my own sanctuary that I'm free to be me in. A place my very soul can take flight....and that is the very most important lesson gardening has taught me....
It's important to feed your soul.
Posted by aster1961 at May 8, 2005 07:45 AM
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