Green Therapy [ April-2009 ]

Every interest has a beginning and every beginning is an interesting story..

The pleasure that gardening gives, eluded me for quite some time. Growing up, I loathed the whole idea of having to do anything with dirt, along with eating vegetables and touching flowers because of the occasional surprises in the form of bugs and slugs. To my mother's chagrin and bewilderment, I was somewhat a freak of nature, as I never stopped to smell the flowers -all puns intended!- even when she begged me to try. My replies to her invitations were wry smiles, blank stares or the occasional "errr...I can try smelling or looking at something that's on its way from the kitchen to the dining table! " Little did I know then, that some of what I ate, came from - you guessed it- the garden.

My father, an avid gardener himself, tried the simplest approach with me.
He ordered....

and I planted or watered- his call. No. questions. asked.

For some strange reason, he was convinced that whatever I planted flourished, and my mother was convinced that my father was crazy.

My siblings who didn't mind any of it, were seldom accosted by him, for this undertaking.

My theory however, is that they were excellent escape artists!

Ironically enough, I am the one with the garden today and they are the ones with no time.

 As a young, newly married, confused jobless immigrant, I remember being thrust with a tiny porcelain pot of beautiful African violets, for my 26th birthday.
 It was a gift from the heart- from my 8 year old neighbor, who spent most of her evenings with me, after school. 

Although I am pretty easy to please, I found myself cringing that day. I foresaw a painful certainty- the slow death of the plant with the added 'pleasure' of my little neighbor getting to witness it, during her daily visits.

Her mother was a genius at  growing, pretty much anything on her balcony, which looked like the Japanese Tea Garden in San Francisco, on a 6 by 6, just below our apartment and I was often struck at how, barren and starkly empty our balcony looked, right above hers, every time I walked into our building.

Surprisingly enough, the flowers bloomed, after a cycle and so did my interest in seeing something thrive under my care!

I realized with time and experience that, gardening indeed is very gratifying.

It beats any stress relieving tactics out there. Sheer bliss is the best description of that moment when one sees a green sprout after much waiting and endless staring at potting soil. Sometimes it feels like all that staring did actually make that sprout, well... sprout.

Seeing a fruit after months of taking pictures, waiting, staring at the bud is exciting. The prospects of using the fruit for many reasons seem endless and makes one feel like an entrepreneur of the next biggest business, Lowe's or Home Depot is going to see.
All because of my first yellow tomato, that vaguely resembles my fourth grade sports teacher.

At the end of any argument, with a spouse or a very stubborn toddler, a good workout in the garden takes care of everything that lingers from the confrontation. I step out onto my patio garden and the rest is buried. Every snip, pruning, plowing, sowing and watering takes care of all that I pictured in my head or decided to do with my childish spouse or controlling toddler-or vice-versa. My garden is a testament to my graceful demeanor, shown on the other side of the Patio door.

Therapy at it's cheapest and best.

Thus the story of my love for gardening continues. I am many many miles away from my parents' garden (figuratively and literally) back home and when I look at the three pots out on my patio, I am thankful to my parents for sowing the precious seeds of appreciating nature, through gardening in me.

All puns intended!