When I read mine I had to laugh. Here's what it said: " Your love of gardening will take on new meaning in your life." How true! Gardening ended up helping me through a rough patch of my life and did indeed, give new meaning to my life and me.
Tonight our Book Club met again, here at my home. It's been several months since we discussed "The Fiction Class", but gardening was discussed as an aside. Actually, we discussed the non-fiction book, "Franklin and Winston" which covered the friendship/alliance between FDR and Winston Churchill during WWII. That in turn, led us to discuss how history has shown that the right person comes forth at the right time in human history. But what about those times when no one seems to step forth? What do you do then?
So we discussed times in our lives when we felt isolated, alone, rudderless so to speak. What did we turn to? What pulled us out of those depths, not necessarily of despair, but of confusion?
One of our members, told us how when her husband died she turned to gardening and how nurturing and growing helped her re-discover herself. Gave her confidence in her ability to nurture and care for herself.
Which brings me to my reflection. Gardening was a past time of my mother's. Over the years I watched her plant her annuals and coax them into bloom throughout the spring and summer. Once she was retired she worked on her house plants year round. Yet nothing took the place of those hanging fuchsias, the geranium window boxes, the phlox, or the petunias that she devotedly deadheaded throughout the summer. The hint of a smile hovering around her lips said it all. Mom delighted in her gardening. And Dad was her devoted servant with his nightly ritual of watering all the plants as the sun began to set. One hand on the hose and the other swatting the mosquitoes that were eating him alive. A bit of dark humor here: when Dad died we all discussed whether we should exhume him for family cookouts since he took care of all the nasty mosquitoes and the rest of us could party in relative peace!
Gardening was a learned activity for me. It truly began in North Carolina. We had moved there after living 6 years in Kentucky. Neither Art nor I really wanted to be there. My Dad was gone. Art's Mom had died 9 days before my Dad. Our kids were in Maine and Bolivia for heavens sake.! My Mom was in a nursing home in Massachusetts with Alzheimer's. But it was a job for him and you went where the job took you.
So while Art travelled to Europe for his job, I began to garden. The neighbors watched me build one garden after another just sadly shaking their heads. "The poor woman. Doesn't she know that that won't grow here? Someone should step in and tell her she's crazy!" My next door neighbor was a master gardener. He finally approached me and said "You do know that delphiniums won't last here, don't you?" Obviously I knew no such thing! I just smiled at him and said "No." He looked at me, shook his head, and slowly returned to his yard.
Here's how gardening took on a new meaning in my life: I didn't mourn the loss of my children like other folks did with the "empty nest" syndrome. I transferred my nurturing tendencies to gardening. I talked to the worms I overturned. I understood perfectly how I "displaced" them. I apologized to them and tried to coax them into new soil to replant themselves.
Every plant I set into the ground got a monologue by me and a prayer. "Set yourselves down here. Relax. Enjoy." The prayer went like this: "God, help this plant live fully. Don't pull them up by the roots and leave them wondering what the next step is."
Gardening gave me purpose. Through planting and sowing and weeding, I re-examined my own life. I pulled from my life those weeds I had allowed to flourish. I got rid of self-doubt, lack of confidence,and self-pity. I turned over the soil of my own life. I looked at all aspects of where I had come from, where I was and where I wanted to be. I brought into bloom the hopes of my own life. I let go of holding onto my kids. I came to realize that nurturing them was done in the sense of day to day responsibility. Now I could be a mentor. I could choose where to pluck and where to plant.
So gardening did change my life. It showed me that one is never done planting nor reaping. And above all else it brought me closer to that Master Gardener, God. And how grateful I am for all He has planted in my life. May I always be open to the blooms he sends my way.
