“I am now getting the hang of it, but I can tell you this is the new me, the planting. Just to watch something I put in the earth and then it can grow and then I can reap from it, you don’t know how it makes me feel,” she said with a bright smile on her face.
Her satisfaction was almost tangible, and I must admit that I felt a tad jealous. I had nothing planted, but days later I ordered four plants and today I am hoping they would bloom soon. The satisfaction of this sister reminded me of my then 11-year-old (he is now 12) who had purchased a gooseberry plant on a field trip and planted it in the yard. Oh, how he took great satisfaction in watering the plant and reported on its progress almost daily. The tree is bearing fruits and he takes absolute joy in picking the berries, which he mostly enjoys himself with copious portions of pepper and salt. He refers to it as “my tree”.
I believe one of the positives (if I can call it that) that have resulted from the dreaded COVID-19 pandemic is how many persons have turned to planting their own vegetables. My Facebook feed is flooded with posts and pictures of the many recently started kitchen gardens. Some who do not have requisite land space to plant are improvising, and plants are seen in cut plastic bottles and boxes among other things.
But back to my sister, the new gardener.
“Let me tell you something, at first I felt that this thing would be the death of me. Not like I contracting it or anything but just how my life has been restricted. I felt as if I was suffocating and like depression was setting in,” she said.
“But I can’t really remember how it started… yes, a friend tell me I should doing some planting. I was like really, I ain’t no farmer. But she encourage me and even give me a few seedlings and when I plant it and then it grow it was like, I don’t know, I can’t tell you how I feel.
“Now I have a few beds with all kinds of greens and is like tending to a baby. I am weeding, watering and just doing everything and enjoying it. I get excited just to go at the back there and do my thing. I had my first karila that I planted, to cook, and it was the sweetest karila I ever tasted,” she said with a laugh.
“The only thing is that I can’t seem to get my children involved. They just happy to be in front of a screen and telling them about coming and helping me is always a hassle. Sometimes I just give up because it spoils my mood.
“I would encourage anybody to try it. If you don’t know just ask for advice, you know, like the right soil and so. You can’t just plant it anywhere and you have to spend a little money if you really want to see the success.
“But you see I didn’t want talk about that first. I want to get people to see how much I enjoy it because if everyone in Guyana could plant it would be a good thing. I know it is not possible and then people would want say what will happen to the market vendors but I still encouraging them to get on board. You have nothing to lose.”
I remember talking to another sister who said planting is therapeutic. “Sometimes I don’t want to deal with humans I just want to mingle with my plants,” she said at the time. Another sister had related how she and her husband can spend an entire day, without eating, tending to their plants.
“You get therapy. You get air freshener. You get colour and of course it also contributes to your financial position. It builds your assets,” Ornetta Waldron had told me in an interview.
“I talk to my plants. I sing to my plants. I kiss them, and I tell them they are beautiful,” she had said.
Talking to these plant lovers forced me to deal with an issue I had buried for a while. From childhood, I developed a hatred (strong word but that is how felt) for planting. I was telling a friend about this just recently and she told me it was time to look past it.
For years I have been trying to do just that, but it stuck with me for a while, well for too long. When I was a child, farming was what we did and there are no boys among my siblings. For some reason, I was considered the strongest among us – I am the second of six daughters – so many of my siblings might have been too young, and much of the farming fell to me. Most days found me farming: early in the morning when the dew was still on the plants, or in the hot sun or as dusk approached.
I never liked it because for me it was backbreaking work. Walking through the narrow tracks was always uncomfortable. My mother, who was often my farming buddy, was nimble among the plants. She moved quickly and I was always rushing to catch up, a process that I never took too kindly to.
I should add here too that my mother loved flowers and our yard was always filled with these plants. After leaving the farm, she would spend hours tending to her flower plants and I could never understand how she did it.
I am now realizing that maybe the process was therapeutic for her too.
So, a significant part of my childhood days were spent farming, which I never took a liking to. It was what everyone did in the community I spent those years in and looking back it was a good thing. We never starved. There was always something and if you did not have then someone in the community had something to share from their farm or field as we called it.
But perhaps because it was hard work for me, once I left that community, I never liked farming and I wanted nothing to do with it. As an adult, I had tried with some flower plants, but maybe I was not as attentive as I should have been because they all died. I saw that as reinforcing that planting was not for me.
Now I am not so sure. Having witnessed all the planting and the joy it brings to many I started thinking that maybe I should start doing something. Sure, as I am, that I will get the support of my son, the gooseberry tree owner, I have actually started the process. No plants are down as yet but the process has begun, and I am beginning to feel just a little excitement building.
Sisters, I encourage you if you have the time, plant something. I do believe it is good for our souls. Now more than ever I think we are seeing that it is better for you to have something planted that you can use in your kitchens. I challenge all my sisters who are reading this to plant something and report your progress to samantha_alleyne2000@yahoo.com. Thanks to those sisters who have been sharing their joy derived from planting. Let’s plant something, sisters.
