“I want the plants to be low-maintenance, so all I have to do is weed.”  That’s what I told the friend who landscaped my yard.

At the time I imagined weeding to be a twice-annual affair of two hours or less.  No problem, I thought.

Since then, I have frequently found myself ‘in the weeds’ outside my little cottage on the pond.  True to the food-service origin of the phrase, there is so much work it’s hard to know where to begin.  If each weed is a customer at my domicile diner, I am frequently triple-sat on the busiest night of the week with every co-worker out sick.

This is not what you think – I am not here to complain.

The simple truth is I have come to love my time in the weeds.  It allows me to plug into Mother Earth.  Garden time is the real-life, down-and-dirty equivalent of a docking station, the iWeed.  I feel most free, most spiritual, unencumbered, floating and free with my feet firmly planted on my ground and Carolina dirt under my nails.  It is when I forget all politics and conflict.  Most of all, in the company of dandelions and zoysia, I remember who I am.

~~~

Just recently my big sister got me thinking.  She started an on-line conversation that led to serious contemplation about who our ‘friends’ and ‘family’ really are.  As we all know, who we’re born to is fated while friendships are intentional.  Our real families are sometimes chosen later in life.  Usually family is a mix of kin folk we inherit and kindred spirits found along life’s path.

In my family it is no different.  We won the lottery in the immediate family department compared to many.

Yet sometimes, in the larger garden of life, I feel like the only non-native species growing in the plot of our extended family.  This began after my maternal grandmother’s death.  She was the True North for our clan, our connection to a set of values and people of another place and time.  When our compass left us, we began to stray, occasionally growing in the wrong direction.

Serving as a reflection of the simple values of the past in a form that embraces every shade of humanity has made me the White Sheep of the family.  A friend recently told me about an old-fashioned flower thought to be extinct.  Recently while tramping through the wilderness, he stumbled across this very gem.  Somewhere in our (red)neck of the woods in northeast Durham C0unty, the old girl still blooms.  A friendly passing bird passed a seed, and with a lot of luck it grew.  More remarkable is that a guy who happens to know the thought-to-be-extinct species happened upon her while she was in flower.  Really, what are the chances?

Sometimes I feel like a wildflower seed pooped upon contemporary soil from another place in time, struggling to be accepted for the unique bloom I am.  People who stumble upon my species and recognize its beauty are rare.

~~~

My back yard is seldom seen by neighbors and is therefore my most neglected patch of ground.  To the contrary, the fair-haired, blue-eyed favored child of a front yard self-righteously boasts regular grooming.  What a show-off!

The best time for the task is also the most needed – following a soaking rain.  And so I am often found in the front yard a day or two after a good rain.  My sophisticated gardening tools are a good pair of gloves and a beaten-up blue Rubbermaid bucket.

A girl can do some really fine thinking while sorting through weeds.  The motif of late: the garden of life.  You see, I’m giving careful thought to which people in my life to keep, which to discard and which to keep an eye on for future decision.  Just like my weeds, my people are falling into the same big buckets.  And if they happen to fall into my symbolic blue Rubbermaid bucket, well, out with the old, I guess.  Or, as my dear friend Dorcas says of the people she secretly sends to Lucifer on the elevator in her heart, “Going dowwnnnn.”

With some it is an act of self-preservation or self-protection.  Mostly it is an attempt to (finally) keep that which feeds me and let go of that which crowds out my sunshine, steals my life-sustaining water or siphons off more than its share of minerals.  I’m doing the calculations, and that which takes more than it gives goes to my trusty blue bucket.

~~~

There are important distinctions between people and weeds.  Well, it sounds so obvious to say it that way.  I guess what I mean is the sorting of weeds is black and white; she stays or she goes.  The weeding out of people, however, is meant to be done with caution and care.  Humankind is gray.  People deserve mercy as often as justice.  With people gardening requires wisdom, patience, grace, and like most things human, timing is everything.  A person plucked from the garden today might just as likely be given another chance on another day.  Circumstances change; people grow.

Here are three examples from my garden of friendship:

Clover

This is someone from college.  We met through campus activities – Chapel Council, Habitat, Lutheran Student Movement and a group that made annual trips to D.C. to work at a women’s shelter.  A couple of collegiate Girl Scouts we were, defying the Greek system and blazing a trail of hippie goodness with a small band of GDI comrades.

The details don’t matter.  The summary is I felt crowded by this good friend – like I didn’t have my own space, as though she needed my root system a little too much.  I stepped back and kept my distance for a few years.  One evening I opened the squeaky doors to my closed heart and looked her up online.  The first Google reference on my screen was her obituary.

I have forgiven myself and Clover, but I will always regret I did not mend things before she was gone.  I wonder what she was thinking as she lay dying at her parents’ new home in a state far away.  Did she feel abandoned, or was she okay?  Had she grown past me, too?

Sadly, there is not an answer.  I do believe strongly in grace.

Crabgrass

That’s right, Crabgrass.  This is the friend that will take over your life.

I learned from Clover that a little patience is wise in the garden of life.  I learned in knowing Crabgrass, that too much patience will give boundary bleeders ample opportunity to steal your nutrients.  They will suck you dry.

Clover had been sick, and I had not known.  So when Crabgrass announced she was sick – dying – I knew exactly what not to do this time.  I stuck it out with a challenging friend, a little sister type who had 7-19 months to live.  She also had a lot of needs – my time, attention, sympathy and so forth.  At month 18 I finally got wise.  Her illness was not physical.  Whether personality disorder, addiction or sociopathy, distance was the only cure.

The difference this time is I separated from this friendship without closing my heart.  She lied, stole and misrepresented her life to everyone we knew.  All of us of good intentions, we all bought it.  There’s something awfully tragic about such a soul.  I wish her well.  I pray for her.  But she is no longer in my garden, and she will not ever return.  My heart, however, is not closed to her.

(Thanks, Clover, for the lesson.)

Jewel

This last one is tough, and unresolved.  This is the Best Friend, the BFF, a rare gem in the garden of life, hence her name.

Jewel and I met in the third grade.  Leslie picked on her.  I intervened.  The rest is history.

The memories are nearly all worthy of a smile.  She was silly, creative and surprisingly unsure in spite of her gifts.  I was super nice and fiercely loyal, willing to follow, to bend to allow her to fill the space in any room.  Together we had a darn good time.  From granny teeth to 3 a.m. wake-up calls to our teachers, we had a hand-written list of inside jokes and escapades that served as our best-friendship codex.  We did not need the approval of any other soul to think we were absolutely hilarious.  Peas and carrots.

High school found us drifting apart.  She slipped through the cracks and fell into some tough stuff.  I desperately wanted the friendship to remain intact.  I thrived in college.  She dropped out.  Trips home found me trying to locate her and unsure she would answer my calls.  I wanted to reconnect.  Slowly I realized she did not want my friendship.  I had always followed her lead.  The leader, however, no longer needed her #1 follower.  It had meant more to me.

Adulthood had our paths cross occasionally.  Once we were roommates.  You know what they say about living with friends?  It’s true.  I do not recommend it.

Our habits, friends and pastimes were quite different, but we could instantly find that place of connection after being apart.  Simply say “granny teeth,” and the laughter would begin.

We talked a while back after I sought her out.  I learned she was married.  I am listed in the phone book and online.  I don’t recall receiving an invitation.  To tell the truth, I was crushed.  Loyal Mitzi would never in a million years, in spite of the roommate pitfalls, fail to invite The Best Friend to her wedding.

This connection was five years ago.  We spoke by phone a few times – until she stopped returning my calls.  Our conversations led to her sharing that she’s different now, that being in touch with me reminds her too much of the hard times and decisions of the past.

She stopped communicating.  I was once again hurt.  She had a great new business I found online, so I sent an e-mail.  No reply.  And again.  Until I finally sent an e-mail one day that simply read, “Goodbye, Jewel.”

The story is she found religion and a good man.  In order to become the person she wants to be, she must reject her past.  I am collateral damage, the baby in the bath water of life.  She does not know that in the end you cannot run from yourself.  We are called to embrace all of who we are in moving forward to become someone new.  That is what makes growth transformational.  Otherwise, we leave hollow spaces inside that leave us less than whole.  I hate to get personal, but what would Jesus do?

Probably not reject a sister to gain a new identity.  But I’m not so sure she knows who I am.  For instance, I studied religion in college.  There’s a connection.  I taught music; she is musically gifted.   My career is a string of really neat nonprofits.  I like to do the right thing, adopt lonely grandmothers, play with neighborhood kids and walk in the rain.  I also like to take my chances.  Did you ever really know me?  Or was I the one-person support system for someone so inwardly focused that you didn’t know the heart of the voice on the other end of the line?

Like Clover, the question is likely to remain unanswered.  What I do know is I am in part responsible – exactly 50 percent at fault.  It is a relationship, after all.  In retrospect, though, I believe her hiding from herself has nothing to do with me.

It hit me a few days ago.  The puppy I adopted while we were roommates is not long for this world.  Jewel’s old cat is already gone – just like Jewel’s mother and my father.  Not a word was shared for either funeral.  To me it is all incredibly sad.

I sent a Facebook friend request.  She declined the offer.  I can’t throw stones.  I blocked her for a year in a vain act of self-protection.  She likely never knew.  She sent a heart-felt letter after we moved out of our shared rental home.  I did not answer – self-protection, again, lest she reject me, again.  I was also hell-bent on being right.

She has a thriving business and is using her God-given artistic gifts.  I am settled.  I built a house and a world of friends through the most amazing story of grace and Good Karma.  I write.  Between us we could script, illustrate and photograph one amazing book.  Jewel and I could give something HUGE to the world.  But that requires connection, mutual acknowledgment.  We are two of the neatest people I know living parallel lives.

The admonition of a grad-school professor rings true: if you’re in a relationship, the thing is you have to relate.  It reminds me of a jewelry box (ironically) another friend gave me one birthday long ago.  It announced in ceramic letters, “Friendship is like a garden of flowers fine and rare.  I cannot reach perfection except through loving care.”  [I have lost track of that friend and the box, proving I am really not good at keeping up with the Joneses.  I will add the one-liner to the codex – that’s a good one.]

Jewel was once called my Best Friend…then demoted to ‘oldest friend’…then an acquaintance I mentioned only occasionally.  Most people who love me now do not even know know her name.  I, too, have edited my life history.

Clover taught me caution in drawing hard boundaries with people you love.  Crabgrass taught me there is a right time for blocking the dishonest or that which takes more than it gives.  Jewel is the gray patch in my garden of life.  There is no right or wrong answer.  The best I can do to honor myself and Jewel is throw this message out there with love and not a single expectation.  I do believe strongly in grace.

~~~

Whew.  I did not expect so long a presentation on that one.  I had the pat three-example outline in mind before moving on to The Big One – the bottom-line illustration.  I exceeded the maximum words allowed in ‘Part B’ of anything.

Here is the real learning: the most important flower gained from my gardening time is not about any plant or any person or any thing at all.  The lesson I have (finally) learned while in the weeds is letting go of the outcome.

That’s right, this nicegirl might have a control tendency or three.

I have spent a lifetime not only doing The Right Thing but bringing fairness and right practice where I find wrong.  What a tiring proposition.  It is only in my fourth decade that a loyal friend has managed to beat into me one Ultimate life lesson: let God do God’s job.  Handle your scandal, but don’t get in the way.  God is trying to work something out.

Planting my hands and feet in the soil brings me closer to the transcendent.  Weeding is good for the soul.  With work gloves and blue bucket I can finally let go of my exacting grip on control.  Mind you, I’m a good witch, but a di-rec-tor nonetheless.  Making things Right is no mere mortal’s job.  I continue to need the reminder.

There is much that needs mending, but I, alas, am not the Master Gardener.  As my 2-year-old nephew said to his 9-month-pregnant mother recently, “Back it up.”  Back it up, Mit.  God is working it out, and you are in the way.

This lesson has presented itself in every aspect of my life.  Sometimes the best thing we can do is nothing at all.  Sometimes the right thing to do is get to work tending our own weeds and let the Universe handle the rest.  In a very real way to deny God the chance to show God’s stuff is a faith statement – lack of faith, that is.  To insist on doing what is not ours is a statement that God, whatever or whomever you believe that to be, is not capable of getting it done.

Unwillingness to release control shows disbelief in the supremacy of the Good.  Conversely, letting go of the outcome is a matter of trust and belief that what is intended will (eventually) happen – even if my exacting, Virgo hands are not touching it.  Amazing.

I have been surprised a time or two when the resolution was not at all my plan – but exactly right anyway.  Just right.

Thank you for the lesson, friend.

~~~

Like literal weeding, emotional or spiritual tending comes in fits and cycles, internal seasons.  It is a deep process of refinement that shapes us to become more like our uniquely beautiful topiary and bonsai souls.

In every life, like every year, at least where I live, there is winter.  This is the time we hole up, settle in and look inside.  In essence winter is the time we mere mortals pause to evaluate and reflect.  Time moves slowly, but winter must happen so we and our weeds can gear up for the next round.  Winter is necessary so life can return as faithfully as daffodils and ticks to my grandmother’s Chatham County farm.  It brings renewal – but not before one long, silent pause.

This is reminiscent of my dear friend Patt who says snow is a blanket of love, a hug from the Universe.  Each delicate flake whispers, “You are seen, you are known, you are treasured.”

~~~

What’s so bad about a weed anyway?  If one chick’s trash is another woman’s treasure, my garden pest is another girl’s rose.  I pull clover from my sod while others plant it proudly in clay pots.

If you ask me, weeds get a bad rap.  They may be considered less-than-perfect floral, undesirables.  Still another view is weeds are garden rebels that risk having to ask forgiveness by avoiding permission.  Now *that* is a plant I can stand behind.

My favorite theory is that weeds, like us, can appear where they are not welcomed.  They shamelessly grow uninvited by the front walk.  Many take root in the harshest of conditions – climbing around rocks and up-up-up toward the sun, craning their weed necks in just the right position.  Weeds are long shots, garden underdogs.  What we wanted was a rose.  What we got was a yellow flowery “thing” whose base is too broad, her leaves inferior.  We hope she goes unnoticed by passers by.

God bless the wayward weed that adds texture and color to an otherwise less interesting world!

~~~

My computer says cloudy and warm today with a chance of light showers.  It’s perfect weather for meditative gardening.  Thinking cap off, fancy gloves on.  Blue bucket.  iWeed.

© Mitzi Viola, 12/7/11