The Growing Season

5/27/2015

The Lay of the Land

By Lyn Messersmith

The Growing Season

            “When something takes root it’s as if it had a mind of its own, growing like mad. Be careful what you plant. Be selective. Once it takes root it will own you.”

Beryl Barclay

           

            I don’t know what the pale purple flowers are really called. I call them a nuisance because they take over the flower beds that my mother in law put in all those years ago. She was passionate about purple.

            Most flowers that grow at Bruce’s family homestead are remnants of Linnien’s planning. Her thumbs were a lot greener than mine, and she tended to choose hardy varieties of lilies, poppies, old fashioned yellow roses, and several kinds of purple posies. I’ve always been grateful for hand-me-downs, so it’s nice to have perennials already in place, but when I plant hollyhocks, delphinium, columbine or marigolds, they invariably disappear in a clump of purple.            

Pull out the purple, you say. I do, every week, by the roots. Trouble is, the roots are all connected, and eradicating one clump makes it grow bigger in another place. I’ve spaded up whole flower beds to start over, but there’s no getting all that stuff out of the soil. I’ve come to realize there’d be more time to raise vegetables, go camping, or out to lunch with a friend if I wasn’t always on my knees digging at the purple, so maybe this year I’ll let it alone.

            Or not. It’s hard to give up a crusade you’ve set your mind to, and that purple stuff has taken root in my head. I guess you could say it owns me.

            Of course there are other things that own me, and perhaps this obsession with the purple flowers is just a way to avoid dealing with the jungle that makes life unmanageable. The overcrowded calendar on my desk proves that I seldom plant selectively.          

            Not many of us consciously set priorities, commit to a particular journey, or evaluate the sacrifices necessary to achieve our dreams. Sometimes, what we plant early on takes on a life of its own and the thought of digging it out to make room for new growth is so overwhelming that we give up and lie down in the same old rut.

            The garden will go in this week. Those seeds and plants are only meant to last one growing season. I’m ok with that, so why have I retained certain ideas from my childhood long past the time to let them go?

            Bruce and I, along with help from neighbors, planted several hundred trees this month. Those windbreaks will benefit others for many seasons beyond our lifetimes. We’re ok with that too, as well as sore backs and blisters, because habitat for wildlife, preventing erosion, and shelter for livestock are lifetime priorities for us.

            Our lives are comprised of several growing seasons. Selective planting is fine, but sometimes old growth needs trimmed. Bruce’s retirement from the rails means we have time to travel and explore our “someday” dreams. Lo and behold, the work ethic my parents planted in me long ago has taken on a life of its own, and is as difficult to dig out as those darned purple flowers. I’m not growing into leisure very well, and my husband may need some help to pull me out of this rut where my roots run deep and tangled.