Gardening in the Time of the Coronavirus

There is no doubt that this has been a strange spring and summer for us all.

COVID-19 has affected everyone in so many ways.For me personally, it started on March 13th when I received an email from my younger daughter’s school that that day would be the last day of school.The children would be emptying their lockers and coming home for the remainder of the year.

Talk about no advance notice and a quick pivot. 

For my older daughter, a college freshman, the news came in the form of a tearful phone call from her saying they were told to clear out their dorm rooms, pack up and head home, again for the remainder of the semester.

I remember assuming at the time, with only a few months of school left, that we would all be home until school ended and then it would be summer and all would be well. I suppose I equated it to flu season— when summer comes, there’s no more flu. 

We actually had tickets for a show that would be temporarily cancelled, so we pushed our tickets to the end of June thinking that would be fine.Of course, the show was permanently cancelled and we did not go in June.

And I never ever thought for a second, didn’t even entertain the idea, that there would be anything but school as normal in September.I thought, of course, they would be back in school. 

And now here we are at the end of August. The virus didn’t go away once summer came and kids will not be returning to school as usual in September.

Not only did it not go away, but it seems to be here for the foreseeable future and life as we know it will forever be changed.

This brings me to my garden.

My garden has been my saving grace during this madness. At the start of the season, I pushed off my work for as long as I could. I cancelled a few projects which hadn’t quite started and worked very carefully on the ones that I kept.

But it was my own garden that kept me sane and helped me to find some peace of mind.  Without my own garden to fuss around in, I would have been more unsettled, more worried, and, in general, a much less happy gal.

As I learned, apparently there were many others who felt the same way.

I can’t tell you the number of calls I received as we got deeper into spring and summer, all from people who are now home full time, looking out their windows, and not feeling pleased with what they see.

In the past those people would have left for work in the early morning, been out all day, gotten home in a rush, trying to pick up kids and get dinner ready, and when they finally settled down, it would be dark outside. When they looked out their windows there would be nothing to see but the darkness. But no longer! Now they are in their houses looking out that same window all day every day and it does not bring them joy.

This has led to a lot of new projects for me, some completed over the spring and summer and some that will begin in the fall.

This also drives home the point of the importance of our surroundings on our lives, our attitudes and our states of mind. 

I had a design teacher who entitled a book she wrote Heaven is a Garden. There is not much more to say beyond that. I have included some photos from my own garden, my personal little slice of heaven.