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Before I get into planning for a beautiful garden,ย here’s the story so far.
We’re overcoming our heritage and living in the light and loveliness and magnificent splendour of the pursuit of excellence. We’re calling it Project Worthwhile Life, and starting with a 12-month program to develop virtues. In this instance, the virtue of beauty: the pursuit of excellence in aesthetics, and we’re working on the areas shown below:
Virtue | Sub-projects | Explanation |
beauty
I take care of my physical wellbeing and surroundings. I live the authentic me. | body | Taking care of my body: diet, exercise, taking my medicines |
presence | Developing a โlookโ or style that indicates who I am, e.g. tiger stripes telling people to tread carefully! | |
home | Creating a comfortable, happy, cheerful, welcoming and calm home that reflects who we are right now | |
garden | Constructing a lush garden for summer shade, winter storm protection, food production and mystical defence |
We’ve already set some goals for the body, presence, and home, and now we’re moving out into the garden.
A Beautiful Garden
My initial thoughtsย on a beautiful garden were lush flowers, abundant produce, weather protection and mystical threshold.ย It also has habitats forย “wild” native and domesticated creatures.ย ย That sounds quite small and simple, but in fact it’s HUGE!!!
I’ve argued that even though we try to hide our authentic selves, they leak out in our homes, and I think this applies to our gardens too. I’ve mentioned that this is kind of perplexing for me because I have been at least three different people during my life so far:
- the pre-dialysis well one that didn’t now she was sick
- the sick one with limited options on dialysis
- the post-transplant really well one
And each of them has had an attitude towards the garden as well as the house:
- didn’t spend much time in it, was content to let it take care of itself
- wanted to nurture and be nurtured by it, but just didn’t have the strength or stamina – was desolate when plants died
- wants lush fabulousness but has no real idea where to start, or even how to remediate the wasteland she finds herself in – is annoyed when storms bring down plants
In its own way, having no idea is a good place to start. And while having a wasteland as a garden makes an unpleasant inference about my authentic self, it makes a good place to begin. Logic dictates that some sort of needs analysis must take place, and some sort of research about climate, appropriate plants and so on.
I have started weeding, and more is certainly required, but I don’t have a clear idea of where the garden will end up. It’s disheartening to weed a space clear and then watch the weeds grow back because the space has no raison d’รชtre.
So I need another plan (sorry Katy):
- agree a garden vision with DB covering use, features and so on
- find out how to design a garden
- research native habitat requirements
- design the garden
- plant it out
I doubt this is all achievable within the next twelve months, but the research can be completed to allow for phased redevelopment, garden room by garden room.
How does this sit with you? Would you care to make any suggestions about what the garden could incorporate? Or what your favourite spaces in your garden are?
Next time, we’ll move onto the virtue of friendship and start with the creatures I share my space with.
Photo of A prettier time in my garden’s life
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