When the Garden Becomes a Source of Guilt.

My first community garden plot, circa 2009.

It seems appropriate to pen this blog post now, as our city just faced its first frost last night and the garden’s growing season has drawn to a close.  For those who lingered around these parts a few years ago, this will seem like a marked about-face, but it’s time I make a confession.

This autumn, after several years of hard work, I’ve decided to give up my community garden plot.

To be honest, I nearly gave it up this spring before I cleared the winter weeds and branches away and set to work with mulching and planting, but then I had a last-minute change of heart and decided to stick with it for another season.  And when things were growing well – when the weeds were kept at bay by near-daily tending, when the veggies were coming on fast and furiously – this seemed like a stellar idea.  But as the warmth of early summer turned to a dead heat, as daily life and daily work became more and more time-consuming, I looked at my to-do list, helpfully reading “Weed garden” or “Water garden” on alternating days, and felt a sense of guilt.

Yes, guilt.  Because by the time August was in full swing, I hadn’t been to the garden in two weeks’ time, and when I returned, lo and behold it was already overgrown, causing a blight on the rest of the well-manicured plots!  If this were a once-a-summer occurrence, I would shrug it off as an extended vacation, but by the time Labor Day rolled around this inattention was becoming a habit.  So was my dismay toward what I’d let the garden become; daily, as I sat in my office working away, my thoughts would drift to the weeds, to the lack of water, to the overgrown pepper plants, and the waves of shame would wash over me.

See, I don’t care to do things halfway.  Never have, never will.  And when I feel I’m not giving my all to a project, it eats away at me.  So despite the frugality that the garden espoused when things were going smoothly – after all, the plot itself was free, and I was growing veggies for pennies on the dollar – the dismay I felt when things got out of control outweighed the era of good feelings that teemed from my heart when I came home with a bag full of the fruits of my labor.

So, as the season drew to a close, I wrote to the garden manager and asked him to take my name off the list next year and give my spot – a prime spot, I might add; I’d been moving steadily up in the garden each year! – to someone on the waiting list.  Someone who will, I’m sure, tackle the project with the gusto and time it deserves.

And next spring, I’ll walk through the garden and enjoy seeing what the new farmers have done.  With nary a lick of guilt.

In most of my life, frugality is paramount.  But a clean, stress-free mind is worth even more.

:)