Re: Passing Thoughts

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Dear Hosta Brethren:

Hostas have always been both important and unimportant to me. When I become
too obsessed about having them, growing them,   learning about them, or
having the latest ones, my sanity  has always been saved  by some very
human  event which puts this  avocation into  a healthier perspective.
When I said that hostas were unimportant to me, I am talking about  my
willingness to admit (and at other times declare - just a little
defensively) that  there are other corners of my life that  give as much or
more pleasure and often remain untended  because of my involvement with
hostas. Some years the balance is better than others.

Because of my gardening efforts, my gardening friends ( who are really
all-purpose friends), the hosta robins, the books, the experiences, the
exchanges of information and gardening joys and calamities, I am a much
richer person. I know I can bring any ordinary social occasion to a numbing
halt  with a discourse on the questions arising from determining hosta
species or the 2,000,000 sports of  H. 'Sum and Substance'. I try to avoid
this (most of the time).We have all  seen that blank-10- mile -look on the
faces of others when such topics have been introduced to non-hosta folk.
Or, we have felt it take over our own face when listening to the minutia of
collecting potato chips  resembling celebrities of the 1950s. Both
activities are one and the same. I do mean this.....although I am not ready
to switch activities in favor of trying to find Pinky Lee in a bag  rippled
Barbecue Chips.  It's the process and the journey which are important, not
the vehicle or the arrival. Before I go further I want to  make it very
clear that this is a conversation I am having with myself this morning.  I
am not a missionary with a cause, but someone who has found the last few
weeks outrageously confusing and poignant am working my way through unnamed
feelings and unarticulated thoughts.

I may well be rationalizing, but I hope not. This process started with my
asking myself  why on earth  I  still cared about hostas, gardens, the
hosta robins, and collecting theses damned plants, after what happened in
New York and Washington. It seemed self-absorbed and uncaring. There are a
dozen cliches which cover this and I know them as well as you do:  "Life
goes on..blah, blah,...." , "pick up the pieces and get on with it...",
"Don't worry about what you can't do anything about", ....ad infinitum..ad
absurdum...BUT THINGS HAVE CHANGE. At least for me. Some innocence has been
lost and I don't know what it will be replaced with. Thousands of people's
live have been  changed forever and the insularity of small town life is no
shield against such an event.

I guess my garden has always been therapy for  me...as have the hostas
themselves...... a type of order   where I have the illusion of control. It
has led me to both people and an enduring process which  are all entwined
with how I think and act. Part of mental health for me seems involved with
scale.  I need a scale  (some days) where  cause and effect are related,
and where weeding, planting, pruning , and care can make things look a
little better.

Still, everything has probably changed. I have held back from posting, as I
am sure others have, unsure of what to say or indeed if anything could be
said....or if these garden things and robins  really mattered.  I have
talked to family and good friends about  much of what has happened and all
of the discussions have ended in a question mark .I don't have a clue about
the future, nor do I want to hear one more person with a crystal ball tell
me what is on our plate. It seems too soon for any truly sensible
prognostications, so I will put my garden to bed and try not to bury my
head in the  sand-augmented soil and wait with the rest of you.  And as
small a motivation as it is  in the scheme of things, a garden offers a
hundred ways to do small good deeds for others. Working on this will have
to do, until the big answers come along.
And as Hamlet so aptly remarked; "The rest is silence."




From Vermont where there are two seasons: winter and road work.
Glen Williams
20 Dewey St.
Springfield , Vermont
05156
Tel: 802-885-2839