Growing Wise in the Garden

a few quotes to ponder:

“A person who undertakes to grow a garden at home, by practices that will preserve rather than exploit the economy of the soil, has his mind precisely against what is wrong with us. . . . What I am saying is that if we apply our minds directly and competently to the needs of the earth, then we will have begun to make fundamental and necessary changes in our minds. We will begin to understand and to mistrust and to change our wasteful economy, which markets not just the produce of the earth, but also the earth’s ability to produce.”
-Wendell Berry

We learn from our gardens to deal with the most urgent question of the time: How much is enough?
-Wendell Berry

Now ’tis the spring, and weeds are shallow-rooted; Suffer them now and they’ll o’ergrow the garden.

-William Shakespeare (1564 – 1616) King Henry VI, Part II, Act III

Many things love to come and live off your plants, including bacteria, bugs, birds, and bunnies. If you don’t control them, entire crops can be ruined. The result of your careful cultivation, in your garden and in your life, can be lost to predators in a short time. . . . Take a look at your life, what toxic relationships, substances and emotions are feeding on your energy and taking away from what you have to give to others. Eliminate them.
-Vivian Elisabeth Glyck

Wherever man exists, he finds the need to redesign, to recreate the world. A more beautiful world, purer, sweeter smelling and more colorful. A garden is probably the spot where the hopes for civilization are best captured. In fact, man defines himself by his garden.
-THE ENCHANTED GARDENS OF THE RENAISSANCE

When the world wearies, and society ceases to satisfy, there is always the garden.

We come from the earth, we return to the earth, and in between we garden.