Bloom Where You're Planted

So this is an idea. There is a nice looking horticulture and landscape design program at one of the city colleges here in Chicago and I feel the motivation to join it. To what end I am unsure at the moment. I have never lived by planning out years in advance or even attempting to achieve some momentary grand scheme. My step-father one time called it faith. That was nice as I used to call it laziness. However, I seem to be getting along alright, or as my father puts it, "you never ask for money and you live on the other side of the country, so I just figure you're doing well."

I have played with the thought of going into a higher level training program in horticulture for the last few years. I had a lot of hang-ups within my own mind ranging anywhere from the fact that I lived in the city and there were no real yards to work with to the fear of what I would do all winter if I truly did begin working full time in a landscape setting.

Before I get too far into this and as I realize that I may begin using the terms "horticulture" and "landscaping" interchangeably, I feel the need to define what is truly meant by "landscaping." Most, when they hear the term "landscaping," picture a guy on a mower or possibly wielding a weed whacker around someone's yard. That is not landscaping, that is lawn maintenance. It has nothing to do with the land or the scape apart from making stock foliage shorter.

I feel that I have been getting around at least some of the fears I initially had. For one, I have decided that I can do as much, if not more landscaping in the city than elsewhere. I Suppose I would look to starting with the Chicago Park District, but even apart from that, there exist many "beautification" companies within the city, whose focus is on urban spaces. My landscaping experience dealt completely with private installations. However, I got to thinking the last time I walked through a quiet, empty, beautifully landscaped yard. I realized it was too empty. Not that I am one for crowds, but it came to my attention that private landscaping is really not enjoyed for anything. For one, often times the most amazing private landscapes are within some community surrounded by other equally amazing landscapes at which point they all just blend together. On top of that, they're all a little different so it becomes utterly clear how individualistic the neighborhood is.

In the city, there are parks. Parks are spaces that can be, and are, enjoyed by everyone; they belong to everybody. I realized at one point that an irony has developed within my psyche. I find myself loathing much of what the city is with its crowding and cramming and square, defined green spaces. And then I realize that it would be amazing to landscape a park, beautify an area that will be appreciated and enjoyed by the public and that is for the public. I have also been reading a bit about Olmsted (for reference, he designed Central Park in New York) and his philosophies and feats of landscape design. Olmsted seemed to have a real handle on what it was to work with plants. One of his key philosophies was the idea that a particular project actually takes years to mature into what it is was originally envisioned to look like by the designer. In a way, he installed babies when he worked and in time they'd become better and better scapes.

This was impressive to me. Living in a time when we want and get everything now and we no longer posses any real foresight, there remains this theme in horticulture which demands that time be taken if quality is wanted. Sure, a landscape can be thrown in and look fine for a while, but what will it become? I find that to be the real question. People think they're putting on siding when they plant a tree, like it's just going to fit just right in that spot never to change. This is seen all the time. Next time you're driving past a new development or complex note the placement of trees in reference to the power lines. Or vice versa, note older trees you see along side roadways and the wonderful holes or "Vs" which have been cut into them in oder to allow the power lines. In a century of development humans have not learned not to plant a tree directly beneath a power line.

This ambition began in college. I was a general laborer for a horticulturalist for two summers and at the end of it I realized that I enjoyed it. I enjoyed for one, being outside all summer, two working with plants and last, it was the first job I had in which I was truly able to witness progress with regards to the work I was performing. It was amazing to see an ugly, boring yard become a lush landscape. It was even more fun to go in and tear out an old, horrible landscape and lay a new one, which was beautiful of course. toward the end of my second summer working for this individual, he began to jokingly ask me if I wanted to stay on with him instead of going back to school. He wanted to expand his business and he wanted me there for it.

I said no, of course. I was too close to finishing school and at the time I was pretty set on going to grad school after graduation for some type of higher psychology or counseling. However, toward the end of my senior year, I remember blurting out in one of my classes when asked what I really felt would fulfill me that I just wanted to plant trees. At the time, my professor looked at me with a smirk and mentioned something along the lines of, "looking back at the end of that, will you really be happy knowing all you did was put some trees in the ground." I had no response. If I were to find myself in that same situation today, however, I think I'd just have to reply, "yes, yes I would be happy with that." And if not happy, who the hell cares, what does that have to do with anything anyways? I think I'm beginning to learn that being active is happiness like to me, and if not true happiness, it at least drains me of energy that would otherwise become silent anxiety. My wife knows what this looks like. She can tell when I've had a boring day by what I say (which is nothing at all).

I don't regret not staying back and helping my former landscaping boss forge ahead with his business. However, the enjoyment of the work has held on. Last year I was at a baseball game with a coworker and he asked me what I would do with myself if I wasn't working as a paralegal (a job I just sort of ended up it, a very common tale). My immediate response was horticulture. Which was strange, because I can never give immediate responses. I always have to think about things and then my answer is in many words in which I am able to include many aspects while committing to none.

I feel that I am a patient person, I feel I desire foresight for myself and respect it in others. I enjoy the slow change of plants. I like what they can teach. That old phrase, "bloom where you're panted." It's silly, but when I really think about it, plants really do do that. It's always comical and impressive to see an amazing plant growing out of/in front of some utterly ugly foundation or next to who knows what. Plants just don't care. They do what they do regardless of aesthetics. I am quite bound to aesthetics. I have a certain ideal I want before I feel I can be productive and this isn't right, it sabotages your life.