WHICH ASPECT OF GARDENING DO YOU FIND MOST REWARDING?

Watching a documentary on Arabella Lennox-Boyd made me wonder about the aspirations of the members of this Forum who express so much devotion and enthusiasm through their sense of wonder and helpful generosity; so many questions came to mind, of which here are a few:

do you create your garden, or does your garden create you?

do you fill a void to avoid a vacuum, or do you open space to make up your mind?

do you control nature, or is nurture your control?

is gardening therapeutic, irritative, satisfying, obsessive, frustrating, infuriating, magical, compulsively enjoyable ... all of these things ... or none?

 

Good questions.
Gardening makes up for the lack of family, relationships, social life and interaction with humans outside work.
Control or nurture? A bit of both; weeds are controlled, plants are kept within loose bounds, but they are also encouraged to grow, given the conditions they require (at least I try).
Gardening is educational and surprising.

 

I have "rooms" which I created. Seeing things develop from seed is wonderful.

 

It's two very different things, depending on where you do it (but then I'm sure you know that ).
In UK it was about creation, the design of the space, creating 'pictures' with plant combinations, pushing the boundaries with 'exotic' plants and filling the spare room with propagators and seedlings. Here, it started off the same, with a blank canvas, but has become an ever-increasing challenge, even a life-consuming battle. It shouldn't be so time to change the approach, adapt to current conditions, especially climatic, scrap the potager and invest in kilometres of geotextile

 

I'm not really a gardener, I hate watching programmes about garden design, I turn them off.
I hate the gardens that they show on the Chelsea flower show.

I do appreciate those that do plant a garden but I struggle to understand why you would grow plants that are the "right" colour rather than plants you like.

So I just get enjoyment out of getting plants, that take my interest, to grow and hopefully flower.

So its the plants that does it for me rather than the garden.

 

I once wrote a 'mission statement' for my garden, to accompany an arty notice: here is part of it:

A garden is a place to be mindful of ideals, and of reality;

of growth, and of decay;

of life, and of death.

So here we trust in abundance. We honour frugality.

Do what we can to be Green, within this great city.

Helping Nature to flourish, within our chosen frame.

Enjoying her produce, and restraining her kindly.

Letting her lines of beauty curve like ribbons through our days.

 

Gardening for me is a means to get outside. I took up gardening forty-odd years ago then very quickly gave it up for golf. Now I am no longer fit to play golf I am a gardener again

 

I agree with everything @pete said. I haven't got a 'garden' as such, I've got a collection of plants. I've always enjoyed collecting plants and I don't really care what the 'garden' looks like as long as I've got the plants I enjoy.
The colours, shapes etc don't have to match, as long as I like the plant it will go where ever I can fine a space for it.
Collecting the plants was also a joint hobby I had with my late partner who was just as mad about plants as I am.

 

I garden because I enjoy challenges, learning something new every day and I really like tinkering with things.

The bonus is keeping fairly fit.

 

My first garden was for me and the missus to sit out in while supping mucky beer and wine. It had a lawn and a fairly unsuccessful flower bed, but it also had a great view of the city lights, given that we were near the top of a hillside overlooking the city.

My current garden started life (literally, the ground was so dead that even dandelions struggled) as a 123 garden, so named because my very young son like to play hide and seek, which he called 123. So it's in sections, with shrubs and willow structures to hide behind. Because I was flat broke after buying the house, having literally spent every penny I had on the deposit, and my entire overdraft on sundries like removals, legal fees, a couple of bits of second hand furniture etc, I used lots of willow cuttings and elderberry saplings so it's mostly native stuff. Over the years, this became a theme, and while I've since deviated from the strictly native approach, is still mostly natural. I love it, and everyone that visits loves it, but it wouldn't win at Chelsea.

For me, the best bit is all the big stuff. I like building the various structures that have appeared, the living willow structures, I like digging and chopping excessive growth.

The worst bit is weeding, something I thankfully don't have to do much of, because the semi wild design means we don't get many plants out of place. I also hate sowing seeds, but see it as a necessary chore, but it's not too much bother because the garden largely looks after itself now.

 

The diversity of your replies is fascinating.

Gardening can — I would say should — as you all more or less imply, be all things to all people, a free for all, depending...

Order, chaos, imbalance, equilibrium but, above all, including a determined and conscious creative effort (lest the whole enterprise were to lose the name of action) followed by a period of contemplation and absorption during which the creative act is no longer ours and is thrown back at us with an approving or accusing eye, as if saying: This is what you have done and with this you must now live, and adding the mantra tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. There will always be a battle between the administering of the human will on nature, together with nature’s determination to enforce its dominance on our resolve; in this, both win and lose, but grow and fortify.

An illustration of this division of purpose can be seen when comparing Monet’s symphonic visions with Cézanne’s The Gardener, where the former’s indefatigable titanic struggles are opposed by the latter’s calm and contemplative resolution; within those two images resides a great question: Which of the two are you?



It is eternally intriguing that a philosopher of Voltaire’ magnitude — having defined his Machiavellian panorama of a human civilization where, somewhat like Swift on his travels, he mercilessly evokes a society rife with mayhem, rape, and murder — not unlike much of what we sadly see today — should then conclude his opus magnum with six immortal little words of immense resonance: Mais il faut cultiver notre jardin.

 

You've touched on one aspect above, M. LAO, which is becoming increasingly apparent. There's a tendency to wish your life away, always looking ahead, planning for tomorrow, or rather, next year. Especially when plants don't live up to expectations or are decimated by natural causes. There's a positive side, insofar as we always get a second, third or even limitless opportunity (depending on your persistence and resources).
It's also a result of living in a part of the world with clearly defined seasons. Who doesn't more or less grit their teeth in order to get through the winter? So we're wishing away a good six months of each year. A conservatory helps, in the northern hemisphere, but it's not a problem in Martinique where conditions are largely the same all year round.