[2021-07-25] Garden gifts
After the emotions of the last few days, I offer a simple post tonight, focusing on something that brings me joy: my garden.
I still marvel at what some earth, seeds, sun, water and nutrients can produce. I suppose that I shouldn't be surprised, having grown up on a farm with multiple gardens. But I wasn't sure that my little backyard space—with some direct sun though not a full day's worth—could produce anything of substance, especially with all my plants in containers.
But produce it has. So far, I've harvested onions, lettuce, kale, cucumbers, baby tomatoes, peas and herbs. Tonight, we ate our first patty pan squash (roasted along with broccoli, cauliflower and sweet pepper), and in the next few days, we'll be eating our first zucchini.
Aside from zucchini and cucumbers, and possibly tomatoes, I don't expect our harvest to amount to a bumper crop. But the point isn't to produce sufficient quantities of vegetables to exceed our demand. It's simply to produce something that we would not have otherwise had.
It's similar to the approach my daughter takes when she goes for a walk. She tries to look for things that she would not have seen had she remained at home. Sometimes, it's a cat; other times, it's a bunny. For me, it's often a cardinal. Nature is wondrous.
Marine biologist and nature writer Rachel Carson said: "There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature—the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter."
Growing a garden and taking a daily walk in nature have been healing for me. I am reassured that dawn comes after night, that spring comes after winter, that vegetables come after planting, that recovery comes after cancer, and that I will be here tomorrow to write the next page in this new chapter of my life.
