Friday, March 30, 2007

Growing Gardeners

I have spent a good amount of time in this garden. I must tell you that Alan Chadwick was very right when he wrote that it is the garden that makes the gardener. From this place we learn not only of plants and their needs but of our own. We learn about pruning fruit trees and many of us cannot help but apply the skill within our own hearts. We learn not only how to prepare a bed for planting by enriching it with compost, but how to clear our own minds, and, using failure as compost for success, begin anew. Most of all, we are exposed to a pace that modern living has long since abandoned. There is a collaborative (human + nonhuman) pedagogy in a garden. There is a legacy inherent in a study of place. There is something else - not too complex for words to describe, but too simple - lurking within everything.
And so I thank the garden and the people it grows, and I am grateful to be one of them. I thank the soil for nourishing me. Again, human words cannot impart my love for this space. I am blessed to be of witness.

Blessings, praises, and Foundational Roots!


Life begins the day you start a garden
-Chinese Proverb

1 comment:

Yvea said...

Beautiful, and so true. I resonate with that so much, Ryan. The Garden shapes us, with leaves as delicate as the breeze and sticks as sharp as beesting, with rain as with sun. It is a cycle.

Thank you for leaving us rich soils to inherit. Thank you and the Garden for making those soils with blessings.

Miss you. Come by soon?
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