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| Today I'm sharing photos I've taken over the past few years |
Dear gardening friends…
Every so often I find myself drawn to considering the foundations behind my passion for gardening. Recently I've been considering the discouragement that I sometimes feel through the latter half of August and the beginning of September. I seem to expect that the gardens should now keep pace with the level of health and lushness earlier in the season. I would like every weed pulled and the edges finely honed, but let's face it… the gardens are tired after a long hard season such as we've just experienced, and I am tired as well. In a normal year, the gardens demand some intense work for about two months from late April to perhaps mid-June. After that, it's generally light maintenance to keep them in reasonable shape. With the vagaries of the past six months, intense gardening has been necessary from mid-March to September and now beyond. We are still waiting for substantial rains to get our plants, shrubs, and trees through the winter. The constant watering continues as we try to provide the necessities of life to the hundreds of plants that call Oak Lawn home. I was digging some hemerocallis for my daughter-in-law just this afternoon and was amazed at how dry the earth has become… no amount of carting hoses and sprayers about is enough to make up for what this season has stolen from us in terms of actual rain.
However, this season's difficulties are not the thrust of what I wish to discuss here. Rather, my thoughts have to do with the natural rhythm of living in a climate with changing seasons and with my own sometimes unrealistic expectations. As I look back to my old photos of our property in late summer, I see that the lawns were generally very brown which indicates to me that perhaps what has happened this season is not that far from the realm of normal. I suspect that we've been blessed for a number of years with more than the usual late summer rain, and I am spoiled for it.
Somewhere along the way, I've gotten past accepting that the cycles of nature must do their thing. I've been trying to maintain a haven for myself and the pleasure of others that isn't always realistic. Some folks get upset with magnolias and feel they're a 'messy' tree because of the fallen petals after their bloom. I think that is almost as beautiful as the blooms on the trees and I have no problem accepting that as part of the garden's glory. Why then do I get frustrated when the leaves on the variegated maple start to lose their freshness in late July and take on brown tinges… is this not also part of the cycle? To my way of thinking, the color of autumn leaves and the lawn covered with them is also a highlight of the gardening year. Why then do I obsess when the white birches drop small branches as a means of self-preservation in a hot and dry season?
I find that I'm actually relegating parts of nature's rhythms to stress and concern, while I'm perfectly fine with others. With introspection, I've come to realize that fear of the unknown figures into this to a larger extent than I've recognized in the past. I am not afraid of falling petals after the bloom or falling leaves in October because I am totally certain that this is the way it has been and should be. However, when almost my entire epimedium collection is burned by the strong UV index in this hotter than normal year, I am "afraid"…. afraid that the dormant buds below the soil will not regrow next season and I might lose these lovely plants that I care for so strongly. Of course, the expense of replacement adds to the concern here as well.
There comes a point where I have to admit to myself that an even greater problem sometimes is lurking in my psyche… I sometimes allow the sin of pride to affect my gardening and that is always a mistake for it can rob one of one's joy in short order. I am truly trying to not allow this to happen. I want to experience the joy of gardening just as I want to experience the joy in all the aspects of my life… my faith, my family and friends, my creative spirit, my love for God and all He has entrusted to me.
Today as I played for hours in the gardens with my four and six year old grandsons, I tried to see this place through their eyes. How they loved running through the 'secret' paths that abound… they shared their thoughts on where we could build a tree house together at some point in the future and what it would look like… they scaled stone walls and they searched for four leaf clovers in the soft green of the lawns. They marveled at the three frogs they discovered in my tiny lily pond and were thrilled at their first lessons in driving the big John Deere lawn tractor... and they ran and ran and ran… thousands of running steps on a gorgeous September afternoon in a garden that is far from perfect… if looked at in a perfection sort of way.
And I must say… I saw nothing wrong in the gardens this afternoon… my mind kept returning to the beautiful wooded pastures where I grew up and played as a child in Vermont… and the stories I told to this little audience of two that dwelled on every word as we laid in the too long grass… and I felt the most joy I'd experienced in this entire season of gardening. I realized that I do indeed have a passion for gardening… a passion that dovetails very beautifully into my passion for life and all that it entails, and on this special afternoon, my overwhelming love for two little boys.
take care, Larry
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