A few weeks ago, in the cold and rain, I thrust perennial sunflowers into the dirt of my garden, the dog watching over my shoulder. Best of luck to you, sweet sunflowers, being planted so late. I tried, and you will too. The sunflowers were part of the endless tasks to put the garden to bed. I claim that I put the garden to bed, but probably it has the resources it needs without me.

If my garden is self-sufficient, then what is my relationship with the earth? Are we partners?

Am I a helper? Am I needed? Climate change tells me I am. This "growing season" was a time of extremes. 100-year record rains. Extreme drought. Never "just right." And so I spent the fall lugging overflow water I collected in the springtime, trying to keep the new plantings alive, praying for them with just a few drops, hoping it is enough.           

Sometimes I think I have an impact on the little paradise I try to cultivate. But, one decision has so many ripple effects, and often I don’t know what they will be... until I do.

The decisions we make in the garden, in the organizations we run, about the people we employ, regarding the way we treat others in the grocery store, about the votes we cast – it all matters a whole lot. How much it matters sometimes can be profoundly overwhelming. 

This started as a musing about the winter garden. One weekend, my dog Birdie supervises me with sunflower roots finding their way to the earth, and then the next weekend, snow serves as necessary cold and nourishment. The earth is going so very deep and what happens on the top that we can see is only the smallest demonstration of what's happening deep down. Things are growing.

The miraculous nature of it all never gets old. The patterns that continue insisting on consistency, despite humans behavior. The fires that probably cleared our woods. The mining across the street. The attempted eradication of the first people who cared for this little part of earth. The bizarre belief that things are "ours."

As the endless tasks outside begin to wane, as my tools are cleaned and hung for the winter, as I place bird-feeders for reminders of living things, I am thinking to the spring already. Some seeds need to be ordered, collected seeds need to be sorted. And soon enough the process begins again. I'll take dirt and milk jugs. I'll put holes in them and I will put some dirt in, and mix it with compost made from scraps. And I'll put the seeds in and I will put my self-contained greenhouses in the snow and leave them alone for a few months to do their thing. Just let it be. 

And then, before I know it, the jugs will explode with plants that are begging to be thrust in the ground next to the perennial sunflowers. The growth will be more than I can keep up with. 

I wish for each of you moments where you see growth hanging with the beauty of snow. I wish for you moments of seeding. I wish for you to leave things well enough alone so that little seedlings might come forth in the spring, just when you have lost hope.