Garden-making is a joy, essential to my physical and mental well-being. It’s well-documented how nature and plants can revive and balance our brain chemistry in such an unstable, threatening world. Instead of releasing chemicals of fear and flight, tending a garden slows me down.
I handle the earth and give my immune system something to do, beyond staring at a computer screen. I breathe deeper. I engage all my senses in activities that aren’t work (even weed pulling), but a kind of meditation on life, impermanence and seasonal cycles.
Unlike creating a painting or writing a book, I cannot walk away from my creation. I must remain engaged in this synthesis of nature, wildlife shelter, food production, art and autobiography that is my garden. A garden is ever-changing, ever challenging, ever awe-inspiring—the rooms of my house where I actually come alive. During a pandemic, my garden erases any sense of confinement, as this is where I belong, a place that guards me. For I’m its guardian as long as I live.
I don’t walk away from my garden in winter, but seek to highlight the mystery and splendour of the cold season, when certain plants put on their show and others go dormant, die back and wait. So, I’m starting a winter garden this year that will never be finished.
Even now, it gladdens me to see the glistening, bare red stems of the dogwoods and the naked flowers of hellebores, purple, white and creamy yellow, arising out of their warm-season slumber. Two years ago, I planted Sarcococca shrubs, and just this winter, their tiny white flowers exude an enchanting sweetness as I pass the front gate.
Even though I’m unaware of what is secretly happening while dividing a salvia, I try to learn more on the subject. With gardening, there is always more to learn—unlike modern “gainful employment,” gardening can never become dull.
Garden-making is unique in another way. It gives me a second chance, which doesn’t happen a lot in life. I can bungle a relationship or a job that can have unsparing consequences. But with a garden, no matter the disaster, it always allows me to try again. There is no end. What I attempted last summer can be tried again or in another way. Even as the flower fades and falls away, the plant is already preparing for a revival come spring.
This continual cycle of decay and rebirth gives me the opportunity for new ideas, new plants, new seeds, a fresh approach, but I must always treasure the Earth and its creatures. I welcome pollinators and shun toxic chemicals, concrete and manicured lawns.
My garden never repeats itself. The seasons change. Everything is transitory. Never again will I have this year what I realized in the last. But in this alone, I learn a great lesson about life.
«LECTURE CONNEXE» THE MAGIC OF A WINTER GARDEN: Anything worthwhile takes time and effort»
image 1 toodlingstudio de image: Pixabay 2 all other images courtesy of author
