What does your Garden say about you?

This question occurred to me earlier this week as I was walking the neighborhood trail that loops behind the houses. There are three gardens that are visible from the trail. One of them, of course, is mine. The other two are tended by two of my gentleman farmer neighbors. Each of our gardens is distinct and I learned a few things about myself through examining these gardens and what they have to say. I imagine your garden, if you have one, says something about you as well.

I wrote this question down in a little book I carry around with me so that I could think it over and maybe write about here. My daughter picked it up and read the question, "What does your garden say about you?" She laughed and said, "Chaos! That's what it says about you."

She's right. My garden is a mess. Not just my vegetable garden but my flower beds too. I could make some excuses about having been in Africa for a good part of the summer but that's not really why my garden is chaos. Its because I planted it that way. I've had a habit of "mixing" my plants together. I think they call it companion planting but mine probably wouldn't be considered a good organized companion planting scheme.

I planted some peas in one bed and sprinkled lettuce seeds in the same bed. That would have been fine except the arugula seeds overtook the bed and were interwoven with the savory that reseeded itself from last season. The peas are past their prime and mostly dried up and brown now. This bed needs a bit of work!

My flower beds have been taken over by reseeding sunflowers, dill, chamomile and run away mint plants. The sunflowers have almost reached the height of my back deck. There are hundreds of them. I would say it looks awful except the birds love it so much I can't bear to pull them up. Every morning I go out and the song birds are having their breakfast. In the afternoon my bees are dancing around collecting the pollen. How can I get rid of the chaos when it brings such life to my backyard? But then that's how I get in to trouble - justifying chaos. I could have the sunflowers in a little more order and still be feeding the birds and the bees. They don't have to be taking over my yard. This parallels my life in a way. I let too much of a good thing take over and then I become stressed.

Back to the veggie garden - I planted onions in with my asparagus and that still looks pretty good, except for the solitary bean plant down in the corner. I am not sure but I think that came from a bean that reseeded from last year because I didn't plant any beans there. At least not on purpose.

My strawberry/raspberry bed went haywire. For some reason all the strawberries IN the bed died but all the runners outside and along the base of the bed have taken over the walking path. I hate to pull them out so I just leave them to run wild. The raspberries are outgrowing the space and probably should have been planted outside the raised beds along the fence line anyway. Oh well.

My "tomato" bed is a wreck. I can't get rid of the "blight" so all the tomatoes are anemic and not really producing. On top of that I surrounded them with peppers, lettuces, carrots, onions and a squash plant or two here and there. This is what really made me raise the question in the first place.

Walking past my neighbor Michael's garden I quickly see that it is all very orderly. The onions are all in square surrounding the bed. Then there are nice rows of squash two rows on each side of the square. Then there are two rows of tomatoes in the center. The rows are evenly spaced, no weeds, no stray growth and each plant is evenly spaced. The plants look robust, especially the tomatoes. Michael is a pretty organized fellow. I can tell he knows what he's doing. He's British. I always think of the Brits as orderly and organized whether or not its true. I think I can learn some gardening from him. My chaos isn't working for me.

This started me thinking whether or not there was "chaos" in other areas of my life that might not be working for me. I think there is. I am in a period of reexamination - jettisoning things that cause me stress and aren't working for me while reorganizing my time around those things that I enjoy and that ARE working for me. This is a continual challenge for me as I have a tendency to let my attention be drawn away when distractions are presented by friends, family or business opportunities. I like to learn and do new things which is great but it can be a problem if not kept in check. I am going to characterize some of these things as weeds that shouldn't be growing in "my garden" and focus my attention on the seeds (projects,work,activities) I want growing. I am going to plant fewer things but give them space to flourish.

My next garden revelation came from my neighbor Justin. His garden is organized in a less linear fashion and very well maintained. He has lots of nice hoops and nets for protection and beautiful dark rich soils in mounds along the fence line. He always seems to be expanding and branching out in to new areas which is something that obviously appeals to me. I stop to talk to him and find out about his latest project. He put in some terraces down the right side of his back yard and he was standing there staring at them. I walked up to the fence line and asked him what he was doing. "Planting grapes. But it take two years to get the soil ready so I am just looking at the dirt right now." I tried to plant grapes once but I didn't do any soil preparation at all beyond putting a little fertilizer and compost in the hole. Maybe that's why they died after the first year. So this gave me some more food for thought. Justin is an avid researcher. He works on a neighborhood committee with me and he had proven to be quite the researcher for our cause. It made me think about my own approach to new things. I have a tendency to research but only up to a point. I am not someone who needs ALL the information to make a decision. Take my bees for example. I got the idea I wanted them. Read up a little and the next thing you know I have two hives. They didn't survive the first winter but what I learned in the process I have taken on to improve my process with my two new hives. They are thriving. I am a learning in action sort of person. But maybe I need to add in a little more planning before the learning in action takes place. Maybe.

So my garden has revealed to me some of my shortcomings or need I say "areas for improvement". Is this just part of who I am or can it be improved? Will I always have some element of chaos or can I keep up my plan to jettison those things that aren't serving me?

In the meantime, I think I will continue the chaos through the fall by throwing in some more peas and lettuces.

What has your garden revealed to you?