Grandma says: One year’s weeds, seven year’s seed.
My grandmother was a wise woman whose sage reminders have often suddenly entered my consciousness when I am about to do something or about to decide to neglect to do something. I was recently with some of my siblings. Our conversations were often joined by Grandma Fannie.
School teacher, farmer, family matriarch, cook, organizer, poll worker, seamstress (otherwise known as tailor except that few women were ever paid the tailor wage scale), and master gardener. No, she was not in those days, certified as a master gardener. She did not need that piece of paper for those visiting from far away to know that her extensive gardens planted in the unwelcoming Oklahoma clay were a miracle wrought by her magic fingers. Besides the luscious rose bushes and the many annuals, the hundreds of gladioli bulbs burst proudly forth year after year in every possible color and hue. I know she had many other plants but these were her pride and joy. One of my sisters rescued some of those bulbs and every year I can count on getting a photo of “grandma’s flowers.” They are just as lovely as I recall them being.
If one is going to be a master gardener one generally has a plan of what plants will obtain the status of weeds and which will obtain the status of honored guests of one’s garden. Grandmother was very clear about which was which. She did not pause as she aggressively subjected those labeled weeds to the hoe or hand spade to which she assigned the role of jury, judge and executioner. One was hard pressed to locate any vestige of weeds and, yet, she did not hesitate to send out the minor platoon – we children - on a further search and destroy mission. Like any platoon sergeant who had earned their stripes she could spot the embryonic weed from the distance of a thousand feet. I swear!
Of course, she was also adamant that we understood that this was a metaphor for all of those emotional, physical, or spiritual tasks which we might be tempted to put off. It was difficult for us children to imagine that a task postponed would grow into a major illness and soon infect the entire pasture of one’s life, but she knew. One was expected to prayerfully scour the recesses of one’s mind for the weeds which popped up each day and to hoe until repentance was realized and amends had been made.
Weeds were not to be tolerated in any section of one’s life. Of course, what she labeled as weeds we might rather think of as gifts - but only in secret. We dare not suggest to this wise master gardener that which she had labeled a weed we were rather pleased to welcome.
I may not be able to so clearly label which are weeds and which are the miracle blossoms chosen by God as did Grandma Fannie, but I surely recognize that daily emotional, physical and spiritual gardening best be at the top of one’s priorities.
Indeed, one year’s weeds, seven year’s seed.
Written November 17, 2016
My grandmother was a wise woman whose sage reminders have often suddenly entered my consciousness when I am about to do something or about to decide to neglect to do something. I was recently with some of my siblings. Our conversations were often joined by Grandma Fannie.
School teacher, farmer, family matriarch, cook, organizer, poll worker, seamstress (otherwise known as tailor except that few women were ever paid the tailor wage scale), and master gardener. No, she was not in those days, certified as a master gardener. She did not need that piece of paper for those visiting from far away to know that her extensive gardens planted in the unwelcoming Oklahoma clay were a miracle wrought by her magic fingers. Besides the luscious rose bushes and the many annuals, the hundreds of gladioli bulbs burst proudly forth year after year in every possible color and hue. I know she had many other plants but these were her pride and joy. One of my sisters rescued some of those bulbs and every year I can count on getting a photo of “grandma’s flowers.” They are just as lovely as I recall them being.
If one is going to be a master gardener one generally has a plan of what plants will obtain the status of weeds and which will obtain the status of honored guests of one’s garden. Grandmother was very clear about which was which. She did not pause as she aggressively subjected those labeled weeds to the hoe or hand spade to which she assigned the role of jury, judge and executioner. One was hard pressed to locate any vestige of weeds and, yet, she did not hesitate to send out the minor platoon – we children - on a further search and destroy mission. Like any platoon sergeant who had earned their stripes she could spot the embryonic weed from the distance of a thousand feet. I swear!
Of course, she was also adamant that we understood that this was a metaphor for all of those emotional, physical, or spiritual tasks which we might be tempted to put off. It was difficult for us children to imagine that a task postponed would grow into a major illness and soon infect the entire pasture of one’s life, but she knew. One was expected to prayerfully scour the recesses of one’s mind for the weeds which popped up each day and to hoe until repentance was realized and amends had been made.
Weeds were not to be tolerated in any section of one’s life. Of course, what she labeled as weeds we might rather think of as gifts - but only in secret. We dare not suggest to this wise master gardener that which she had labeled a weed we were rather pleased to welcome.
I may not be able to so clearly label which are weeds and which are the miracle blossoms chosen by God as did Grandma Fannie, but I surely recognize that daily emotional, physical and spiritual gardening best be at the top of one’s priorities.
Indeed, one year’s weeds, seven year’s seed.
Written November 17, 2016
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