An Odyssey. But not as long and not so treacherous
I live life on the edge, so today, I ordered more perennial seeds (whoa! is right). And I don’t even care if I can fit them into my garden. I just want to see if I can grow them (such a rebel!).
I confessed this to my husband at the dinner table. He asked if they were for the new bed I just started. I told him probably not because it will take like two years to grow these into a plantable size. And that, “I think this might just be another hobby of mine. Growing perennials from seed.”
“That’s a really long hobby,” he said, eyebrows raised. “Two years? Who are you, Odysseus?”
Crickets from my side of the table. Lol…boy math.
Overused life metaphors come from the garden for a reason.
Before gardening, I hadn’t really put into practice the gardening metaphors we use to describe important moments in life, like “putting down roots” or “planting the seed.” These things take time and aren’t satisfying until they are. Who has that kind of time? A “youngster” you say? Why yes. Another reason why youth is wasted on the young.
Marrying my husband. Well that’s the exception. That was ‘putting down roots’, ‘planting a seed’, and ‘everything coming up roses’.
And sure, there was college. It probably planted more seeds that I realize, but school never really brought me overt satisfaction. It was an obligation I had to get through, something I was supposed to finish before my real life could start, or so I was told. When I finished, the predominant emotions were relief and whatever feelings accompany “ok, now what?” There was little pride or sense of accomplishment. Pretty expensive indifference, amiright?
Buying a house didn’t feel like putting down metaphorical roots, it was just a financial decision. At the time and in that place, buying a house was cheaper than renting.
Literal Roots
The upside of homeownership was that it came with my very own yard that I could sink my trowel into. Gardening is a family hobby - career in some cases - so it felt natural. Despite that, I had no idea what I was doing. And I certainly didn’t know that I was introducing myself to the kind of satisfaction that only comes with patiently waiting for something you did on purpose like a year ago to…happen, flourish even. For me, it was actual roots and actual seeds that gave me my lessons in passive and patient waiting.
Through waiting, I learned that real life gardening is not the picture I carried in my head: plop a plant, water, and watch it grow. A cute hat and a cinematic wipe of the brow before tossing back my waves was also in there somewhere.
In that first year, I gardened like that image but as my four-year-old might draw it. It was pure enjoyment, bright colors randomly dotted throughout; haphazard, and lacking skill.
Dear Past Self, Bless your heart. Love, Current Self.
Why make it easy?
I let myself learn the hard way, still do though. I can’t help a good garden experiment. Researching books and the internet? Nah. I’ll just try it out myself and see how it goes.
And because nine years ago when I started my first garden, I gave myself the gift of long-term, well-earned satisfaction, I can categorically declare that the most enjoyable experiments are of the seed-sowing-variety.
My secret cheat code is to sow native perennials. It sounds more difficult. But with no skin off my nose, I’m actually giving them the exact conditions that live in their DNA. Plop the seeds in soil per packet instructions, and set them outside for the winter. Let the rain come, the wind blow, the snow fall, and the cold blast. The seeds are built for it. When the spring comes, they’ll start popping up. That’s when you’ll be a bit more precious with them, this is when they’re most vulnerable. Give them a bit more water, a bit more cover, a bit more protection.
But it hasn’t all been self-tortured experiments. I also attend Gardeners World University every Friday night on BritBox. That education has likely saved me many growing seasons’ worth of learning and a heck’uva lot of money with its propagating tips and seed-sowing tutorials. It also instilled in me an Earth-first mindset. Thanks Monty and crew.
Odyssey Schmodyssey
But back to those perennial seeds I just ordered. Yes, growing a perennial from seed can feel like an Odyssean stretch of time with not-quite-so-dramatic Odyssean toils. It can be frustrating. Some seeds won’t germinate, some seedlings will just keel over without notice, and just when they are ready to start living their lives in the ground, they get munched on by local wildlife.
That all sounds awful but I swear I’m not a masochist.
It’s hard to imagine that it's all easily forgotten when the process actually works. When a plant with real leaves, a strong stem, bustling roots, and a goddam actual flower exists because you made it so. Let’s be clear that the plant was responsible for 80% of that.
But seed meeting soil? Watering? Cover? Transplanting at the right stage? Well, that was me.
How it’s possible that that is more satisfying than getting my expensive-ass bachelors degree, I can’t begin to explain. Maybe a bachelor’s degree was designed to bring us further from nature - where we came from and where we should still belong. Seed sowing brings me back to it. But that’s just my guess.
Plant the seed.
And now that I let myself in on the secret of delayed gratification, I plant all sorts of future surprises for myself. Some are little, some are hidden, some are grandiose. So often I forget about them, so when they pop up, it’s out of nowhere and it’s pure delight.
Imagine if I never did that? I suppose ignorance is bliss, I’d never know I chose not to surprise myself with joy. Perhaps there would be an emptiness, a void of “could have.” However, since I am not ignorant of this particular thing, I have a choice today. I will not be gifting future Ellen with a surprise-less timeline. Hers will have joys. So when despair threatens her heart, she will see a flower she grew from seed reaching for a hug. A bee will land on it while she’s watching. And she’ll feel reprieve, even if for a minute; she did some good, after all.
What seed will you plant that surprises your future self?