We all make these associations in our lives. My gooseberry association is a direct line back to my very GREAT grandfather. I spent my time on his farm following him around like an imprinted duckling, so now, as my own teeth get long, every smell and sight jogs me back to what I now know to have been a magical childhood.
Maybe that is why gardening is so essential to me other than the 'important' reasons for doing so like diverse, organic food, permaculture practices and such. It connects me in a truly profound way to the very person who most influenced me simply by the way he moved in nature. Everyone should be so lucky to have a Grampa Marvin.
4 comments:
If you were to substitute grandmother for grandfather and currant for gooseberry I could have written your first paragraph.:) It's interesting how some people, grandparents, have a profound influence on us that is not realized until much later in life.
Your gooseberries look great. Mine...well...they blew away in the wind. Oh well, easy come easy go.
By the way, thanks to you I have a small Reliant peach tree growing in my garden area. Boy was that hard to find. Thanks for influencing me.
ha! I bought a second Reliance that was actually loaded with peaches and I may actually get 2 or 3 by ripening time. They are iffy for we here in the mountains but I keep trying. I also have the advantage of ordering all the fruit trees for work so I tend to choose varieties I want for my own mini orchard. Now, where do I put the 6 new apples and 4 new pear varieties I plan for next year!? Oh well, one step at a time.
And yeah, we are lucky.
My maternal grandmother was my model. She was of the geranium-only school though (and I do mean pelargonims not the perennials) and would dig hers up, shake off the roots, pack them in newspaper and put them on a bus to her Florida winter home. And (and!) hers were ONLY red or white.
One year, she had a pink one, quite by accident, and she called it (with a cackle) "the bastard." Well, when she died, I inherited the bastard, and kept it alive for 25 years.
Anyway, maybe she wasn't the best model for outdoor gardening, but...well, memory is a funny thing!
I think gooseberries beat pink geraniums though, so you win Randi!
El...your gramma sounds like one 'el' of a gal..sorry, had to do it.
25 yrs with a geranium tells me all I need to know about how you loved her!
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