I have been taking care of the Garden Center at my local Kroger for two summers in a row now. It's my responsibility to grow them with care, and keep them looking beautiful for the customers, so they will sell.
The weather has been very unpredictable and harsh this year. When you have plants growing all around you, inside of a tent, and outside as well...there is a lot to deal with. These poor plants were started from a seed, or a cutting and their sole purpose is to grow and look beautiful, to bring pleasure to the person that purchases them. When plants are subject to freezing cold temperatures, 40-50mph winds, rain, and extreme heat and sun...they struggle to fulfill their purpose. They freeze, and some of their leaves and branches die, the wind breaks the branches and even the leaves. The rain causes over watering and the leaves turn yellow, and with the rain comes more wind. The extreme heat burns the leaves and the flowers.
I could spend a month nurturing a plant to beauty, and one strong wind can ruin everything. When the plant gets damaged, like today with the strong winds, it breaks my heart to have to cut that whole big branch off. But here are some things I have learned about growing plants. For one thing, I have grown plants my whole life, but I grew house plants. They don't live out in the weather, and they have very little problems when they are living in a nice comfortable house with no adversity. If you find the right spot for them, they will be happy as can be and bring beauty to your home for years. Outdoor plants are a whole different story. I have had to learn, when the branches are dead, cut them off. When the leaves turn yellow or brown from the wind and the storms, cut them off. I have experiences with my plants, that even though it hurts to lose a limb, and when I have to pull all those ugly leaves off leaving the plant looking bare...it is the right thing to do, and the best thing for my plants. If I DON'T cut them off, the plant spends it's energy trying to heal or repair the damaged parts, and it stunts the new growth...or slows it down. When I take off the damaged parts,...new growth is accelerated!
To my surprise, I keep learning over and over again...that as painful as it is to cut and pull, leaving the plant looking very homely and not so pretty...if I just give it a little time and special care, the plant will grow back to it's full beauty, and usually more beautiful than it was in the first place. :o) It just takes time. When I first started my job last summer, my boss would come out to the Garden Center and mark down all the damaged stuff to get it out of the store. She thought it was worthless and nobody would want it. But this year I asked her not to do that. I opened a "Plant Hospital" in my Garden Center where I nurse them back to health and sell them for their full price! I take care of them and bring them back to their intended purpose. To look beautiful and bring pleasure and joy to their owners. Some don't make it back, but most of them do.
Today it crossed my mind how much this reminds me of my life. I have a Master Gardener. I'm so grateful that He doesn't dispose of me when my branches break and my leaves turn brown. He prunes me, as much as it might hurt him to do so, because he knows that I will become much more beautiful, and serve my purpose in this world. And I bet he makes the same sorry face when he has to do the clipping. But the storms of life break us. We need to be nurtured back to health, and it might take a little time...but when he prunes the dead or diseased things from me, the life will be forced to bring new growth and pretty new flowers.
I like Gardening. :o)
