The picture on the FB page showed a bee, hobo style, sitting on a curb, with a little nap sack. His sign said "I am hungry. Plant more flowers."
Well I don't need a starving bee to let me know I should plant more flowers. All I need is spring fever and I am all over that til every little space in the garden is full!
What I think we need is a little cartoon of a bee gasping, taking his last few breaths, as he has sipped from a flower laden with chemicals. His tombstone says "Spray fewer (no) chemicals."
Here we are on the edge of a new gardening season. We love our gardens. How they make us smile. How we feel so connected to our little patch of earth. Sharing tomatoes or forcing zucchini in to the arms of passerbys. Our pride swells as people tell us how lovely or beautiful or pretty or wonderful our gardens look.
Pride can be a tricky thing. If you are motivated by other people telling you how wonderful your garden is, you might just be missing out. You might be picking up lots of flowers to keep up with the Jones’, who always seem to have more flowers than you. You might be spending a little too much of your time putting down weed killers because the TV told you that is how to show the neighborhood you care. You might even be running your sprinkler system twice as much in August to hold on to the title of "greenest lawn in the county." The company who "takes care of" your patch says "sign here" and they might just be running amuck, spraying when it isn't even necessary. But it is eassssy that way, yes?
There is another path to walk. And you can do it barefooted. It is the choice of nurturing. You primp and tell your flowers how beautiful they are, and to the newly bloomed, you might blow a kiss of welcome. The deep smell of the soil makes you smile. Watching bees and other pollinators land on a dandelion (or two or twenty) in your meadow (not lawn!) causes you deep delight.
You go to your garden because it is part of who you are. It is a reflection of how you feel about being a caretaker of your patch, which is part of the bigger patch, called Earth.
You don't "do" the willy nilly spraying, and you don't "buy in" (literally) to the weed free lawn. Ummm. Weed free means no dandelions and no clover- two favorite food sources of bees! Garden for yourself. Garden for your patch. Feed it with love.
When did the TV learn how to manipulate our pride so well? How long has this been going on? How much longer will it go on? Do you see it? Will you choose?
A brand new gardening year is upon us. Think about it. No really...THINK.
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