What Life Skills Can Gardening Teach You?

Selling my sunflowers at the farmers' market in Cambridge, MA

When my sister and I were kids, my mother used to make us weed the garden beds. We hated it. Actually, we considered running away we hated it so much. We ripped out everything including some perennials in hopes that our mother would realize what horrible gardeners we were and abolish our weeding responsibilities. It didn’t work though. We got scolded and sentenced to more weeding. We swore to each other that gardens were stupid and the only reasonable way to spend our summer vacation was to watch MTv. What 90s teenager growing up in the country with no nearby friends could resist a days’ worth of big hair band videos?

I always laugh when I meet a gardener who comments “Isn’t weeding like meditation?” In the countless times I’ve heard this it always comes from a woman whom I’m certain never ate potato chips for breakfast or considered drinking puddle water because it resembled coffee. “No,” is my reply. Weeding is actually a huge pain in the ass. I thought this when I was a teenager and I still believe it now. There’s nothing more overwhelming for a gardener than seeing your beds covered in knee high weeds. That’s not meditation it’s purgatory.

Planning is Essential

I’ve been gardening for a long time and one thing I’ve learned is careful planning can make gardening so much more enjoyable. Weeds are inevitable. There’s no getting around it. Have you ever heard the old saying… “One year of seeds gives you seven years of weeds?" This is the garden procrastinator’s worst nightmare. By letting weeds go week after week you give rise to weed seeds, compounding your weeding problem for years to come. I make it a point to weed regularly and by regularly, I mean every week during the growing season. It’s like setting time aside each week to grocery shop or clean the toilet or the countless other obligations that come with being human. While it’s not quite meditation, it is a good chance to detach and mindlessly listen to music in the sunshine.

Whether you’re growing a few tomato plants on your deck or acres of row crops, planning is essential for success. Plants need to be fed and watered regularly and often times potted plants require more immediate attention than field grown crops. Here in Zone 5 the growing season is relatively short but it’s also a long time to wait for a fresh tomato or cucumber. Your efforts could be thwarted easily by a curious bunny or a hot and dry weekend if you don’t plan accordingly.

Did you ever go to a farmer’s market and wonder how one farm can produce so much week after week? One trick they use is succession planting. How many times have you planted your whole seed packet of green beans only to be buried in green beans two months later? Then another month goes by, and you can hardly pick enough for one meal. I have definitely done it. Often times the initial harvest on a plant will be your most abundant. By staggering your planting dates with some plants, you’re able spread out your harvest so it’s not a feast or famine situation.

Sunflower seedlings planted in succession one week apart

Knowing Your Limits

I love sitting with a cup of coffee in the winter next to the woodstove and thumb through all the new seed catalogs that arrive in the mail. Their colorful glossy pictures are like garden candy. When I first started gardening, experienced gardeners advised me to start small. So…I planted an acre. Flowers, vegetables and everything that looked fun and exciting in those catalogs was purchased and plopped into the soil. More had to be better…right? Well, I was wrong. By June, the weeds were so tall, I couldn’t find most of the plants. I felt like a failure. It was too much to maintain for one person. Since then, the size of my garden space has decreased significantly but I’m harvesting more than ever. Sometimes less is more.

Patience

Gardening has taught me patience and I’m not saying this carried over to all areas of my life because I still drive like I’m in the Grand Prix, but I do value the process of delayed gratification. Instant gratification is everywhere today. We pretty much can know anything within seconds. Gardening forces you to slow down and wait. When I was a child, before DVD players and VHS tapes, The Wizard of OZ would be aired on TV once a year. Its air date would be advertised in the newspaper and the TV Guide weeks ahead of time so families could plan accordingly. Mom would make popcorn and the four of us would snuggle on the couch together, glued to the tv. When I was about ten, we bought a VHS player and that year I recorded The Wizard of Oz off the television. My sister and I watched it almost every day. At one point I could recite the entire film. The next season when it was aired on tv we didn’t watch it. It lost its appeal.

Technology has given us some amazing conveniences, but it also stripped away some of our ability to experience the power of delayed gratification. Watching the Wizard of Oz on my VHS cassette never felt as good as it did when we waited for it year after year.

A season of gardening has several milestones to celebrate but each must appear in their own time. Beginning with the yellow forsythia in early spring, to young seedlings poking through the soil, to my first cucumber; it’s about balance and our interconnectedness with nature. I'm always in awe when I hear the spring peepers for the first time after a long winter, or the sound of cicadas singing in the meadows on a hot summer day. I could record it, but just like the Wizard of Oz, it wouldn't be the same.

Observation

Delayed gratification can make you a bit nutty especially when the time frame is several months to the reward. Failure hurts especially for a gardener because you rarely get a second chance to make it right. I notice things like deer and rabbit tracks in my yard. I check the weather obsessively. I investigate holes in the leaves of my plants and then hold the responsible parties accountable. I monitor my cucumbers and zucchini for blossom end rot. I talk to the cat about chipmunks.

Growing a garden is similar to raising chickens; everything wants to eat or destroy it. Being a proactive observer will better your chances of success.

Self-Reliance

I turned the key over on the tractor one morning, and nothing happened. I tried it again, and nothing. Shit... this is not good timing. I had hours of tractor work planned for that day including brush hogging and planting another 800 sunflowers. I remember the previous day my terrier Pete took a special interest in the dashboard of the tractor. He pawed at it and sniffed it obsessively. It made me think. So, I went in the barn and got a few tools. I am no mechanic but there was no way I was going to call a farm-machinery mechanic to make a house call for $700. I lifted up the hood and removed the dashboard. My eyes grew wide when I noticed a mouse nest tucked right behind the key ignition switch. I removed the nest and found a chewed wired. I disconnected the battery cables fearing I'd be electrocuted. Probably a good call. I then stripped the ends of each wire, intertwined them, and taped them with electrical tape. I reconnected the battery and turned over the key. The tractor started right up. I thanked Pete and scolded the cat for allowing this to happen.

Pete takes his job seriously.

As your gardening experience grows, you'll want to expand. The larger the garden, the more innovative you must become. Many of us are solo gardeners with a couple weekend warriors to help out from time to time. The internet is full of ideas on do-it-yourself advice. Now, I don't advise climbing on your roof to put new shingles on, unless you're a trained roofer, but there are many things you can learn to do yourself with a little grit and determination.

Confidence

When I lived in Massachusetts, I had a farm stand at the end of my driveway. I sold flowers, vegetables, and eggs. People would leave me notes… Best asparagus ever, I love your sunflowers. I’d go to the bank and see my flowers sitting in a vase at the teller window. Heck, I even went to a Starbucks in Boston and saw my flowers. I felt a great sense of pride to be able to provide a small piece of happiness to my community.

When I started gardening, I was like many of you. I killed a lot of plants and grew a bunch of unproductive crops. I met countless gardeners willing to mentor me. With persistence and guidance, I began seeing success year after year.

Not everyone will want to garden but everyone must eat. Celebrate your efforts of a job well done. Be the reason someone waits for that very first home-grown tomato or make someone smile by giving them a bouquet of your own flowers.

My roadside farm stand

-Kimberly

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