All of my art is subconscious, from tiling the bathroom to the Cherokee garden a theme my subconscious has been working on will gradually emerge. As I was sorting my photos of Cherokee and pulling in other photos to supplement where something has not yet happened at Cherokee that I expect to happen this summer I realized it is all about food.
I started with the bird banquet, wanting to plant 88 sunflowers in honor of a friends’ 88th birthday and inspired by her daughters donation of $88 to the Welcome Table Community Center and gardens. I found photos of cone flowers we can put in a bed for seed eating birds like goldfinches near the bird feeders. I organized photos of Boy Scout Troop one planting trees to celebrate their one hundredth anniversary thinking about how many animals eat acorns and other food provided by the trees they planted. I found photos of milkweed to show what will grow where we planted swamp milkweed plants and other milkweed seeds last fall and how monarchs will use the plants during their amazing migration. I moved on around the corner to show the color garden which holds a lot of nectar plants to fuel the butterflies for flight then on to the vegetable garden where we grow food for ourselves.
Beauty is food for the spirit. Watching a caterpillar consume “your” plant and transform into a butterfly is food for compassion and generosity. Watching a beautiful sunflower brown and droop its head in the fall then feed birds all winter feeds our ability to see beauty in the entire cycle of life not just the first flush of bloom. Leaving the seed heads of cone flowers in the garden all winter instead of “tidying up” the garden feeds our ability to look at things from someone elses point of view. Is it a mess or is it lunch? Watching a mockingbird mock and a blue jay scold and a hummingbird dart feeds our sense of wonder at the diversity of life and surely grows our curiosity.
Starting plants from the garden to share with others (with seeds or cuttings or divisions) can feed the students sense of their own ability to give, to make a difference, to be a citizen of their neighborhood.
In our own vegetable garden at Cherokee integrated pest management causes us to provide a home for the toads and frogs we find there so they can eat some of the insects that may eat some of our human food. Charity asks us to donate 10% of our produce to the food pantry or a community cook- out and feed our neighbors. The earth asks us to feed back to the soil what we take in the form of last year’s tomato vine and this year’s cucumber peel. The earth will be hungry if all we do in our vegetable garden is take and not give back, the soil will become depleted and it will be harder and harder for us to feed ourselves if we don’t feed our soil. It is all about food! Feed your own soul, body family and community spirit.
Come garden with us! Our big weekend will be April 8, 9, 10 when we will be gardening all over our area; we need folks to come for as long as they can to help and learn and share. Come see all the opportunities we have for you to grow food for yourself and your family. Free food will be provided for volunteers. Also check us out on Saturdays; call 9186913223 to find out where and when we will be at Cherokee or the Welcome Table Kitchen Garden Park or the Welcome Table Community Center or our other sites here in far north Tulsa and Turley. Let us know if your neighborhood needs some plants or wants to start a “Let it bloom” organization, Let Turley Bloom will help get you started. Check back here for more to come!
http://beyondthefarm.org/growing/check-out-our-video/
Very thoughtful, and thought-provoking. And somehow peaceful. Thank you, Bonnie.
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