I recently read an article that got me thinking about how incredibly important my garden is to me, not just as a hobby or a potential source of fresh food, but as a way of re-connecting with myself and healing my anxieties and taking my worries away.
''I felt like the world around me was a dangerous sea and my garden was a little green life raft. I cut a new, long bed out of the grass. I worked the soil until I couldn’t find a sliver of weed root. I barrelled tons of compost and poured it all over the garden to improve the structure of the heavy clay. I sowed seeds, bought more herbaceous perennials than I could afford, and scarified the grass like a man possessed. As I worked on the garden the garden worked on me.''
[Source: Tom Smart / The Guardian / https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/gardening-blog/2016/jan/22/gardening-is-the-best-medicine-for-the-mind ]
I couldn't have put that better myself. As I work on my garden, my garden works on me. That's it.
Over the last 2 weekends S and I built two new raised beds, filled them with nearly 4 tonnes of soil, built a frame for anti-bird netting, planted potatoes and broadbeans and nurtured countless seedlings on the window sills. Most of that was hard, physical work, but it didn't just give me sore muscles. It cured a severe headache I had been dealing with for four days, it gave me a sense of accomplishment and made me feel re-connected with nature and with myself. It made me feel found, as opposed to feeling lost. I was there and then, grounded in the moment, doing something I find deeply meaningful. Getting my hands dirty and my soul clean. Healing.
