SEEDS FROM PLOT 509

     I can not imagine myself without a garden. It is an essential part of my life. Like air and pants.
     I first dabbled at gardening when I was a young child, hanging out with my mom. She didn't have a really green thumb, but she did appreciate beauty. She showed me how to do spring clean-ups - trimming back the dead spent canes of the roses, planting petunias and geraniums. The love she had for those plants that did survive is what carried them along, I think.
     As I got older, I started my first garden as an adult with my to-be husband almost 20 years ago. We both decided to go forth and do a major clean-up of the front and back yards of our house we were renting. It took awhile, two to three months, but when we finished, we had that place looking so well loved and homey. We learned about tomatoes the hard way; they died quickly with some sort of disease. We learned that you just can't force something to grow. We learned taoist gardening. It's rather humbling, really. It's almost as if all of us (gardeners alike) bow down to the garden goddess and hope for the best and all falls into place. It was really a sad time when we moved.
     The next place we moved to needed serious work. We dug up a fourth of the back yard and made a big garden. There was plenty of sunshine. We grew some corn, broccoli, several kinds of squash, and lots more. At the same time I had some pet rabbits, so we tossed them the lamb's quarters that grew so well in the garden. They loved it. I learned that weeds are really just misplaced plants, in my opinion (the lamb's quarters were quite happy where they were.)
     In yet another move, we lived in a second floor apartment, and I insisted on having container plants on our balcony. We had nice annuals, marigolds, geraniums and others I can't remember. Plus we had some patio tomatoes. That was a plus.
     For a short time we lived on an organic farm/orchard, primarily apples and stone fruit. This was a commune-like farm, and so we put some time into digging into a weedy but great earth garden with several other young travelers who have come to pick fruit for the season. Winter squash was the main garden crop and we all enjoyed the sweet flesh. This particular garden brought together some sisters and brothers, who, while still in travel mode, got a chance to dig into the sweet earth, got grounded, pun-intended, and shared in a communal moment.
     Now we are back living in the city, in a boxy apartment and found an opportunity to rent a small plot, sixteen by thirty-four feet, in a community garden. What luck. A little piece of Eden for my family to enjoy. It was really neat to see my four and a half year old picking snow peas and sugar snaps, munching 'em down. Even a little spinach and chives. Can't get them to eat it at home - has to be here, in our little paradise.
     There'll be folks taking walks through the garden, some with their cats, even. The people are attracted to this, drawn to it. James Redfield talks in his book, The Celestine Prophecy, about the energy that emanates, like a glow, from the plants. He talks about the healing qualities it has for our spirits. I do truly believe this. I am drawn to the gardens, any garden. I can not imagine myself without a garden.

Aspen Marks