First Garden
I was totally connected and a part of the garden
What a lucky kid
I was!
Mom gave me this little space to do whatever I desired. She never told
me that certain plants were weeds and others desirable. Every plant
got to grow at least a while, until I decided it should live or die.
Many residents of this extremely visible, in front of the house garden were the everyday acceptable sorts of flowers: graceful columbine, colorful sweet William, little creeping sedums. Others were wildlings, discovered during walks in the woods or fields, carefully dug or seeds collected and tenderly planted, treasures for the garden.
Hours of discovery were spent engrossed in this small haven, allowing it to disclose its secrets.
- The shapes of seeds of various species...each unique
- Learning what a newly emerged seeding of each species looks like
- Delighting in the way not every child plant looks just like its mother
- Observing how each plant blooms in its season, then develops seeds for the next generation
- How some died after blooming and others lived
- Seeing some lived through the winter and others died
- Meeting the many insects and other animals who also shared the garden
Hours spent in the garden were like leaving the rest of the world and entering another, where I was totally connected and a part of the garden, a resident, like each plant or snail.
Let children walk with Nature
Let children walk with Nature,
let them see the beautiful blendings
and communions of death and life,
their joyous inseparable unity,
as taught in woods and meadows,
plains and mountains and streams of our blessed star,
and they will learn that death is stingless indeed,
and as beautiful as life.
John Muir 1838 - 1914
