Crouching elder, hidden sage: Dealing with aging in the garden
Over the course of my life, I’ve followed two main role models for physical health. One is my father, who jogged and swam well into his 80s. The other is an elderly neighbor of mine, who, despite recently passing the 90year mark, still tends her yard and gardens. She does everything – mows her acre’s worth of lawn, weed whacks, rakes and shreds the fall leaves, and protects her lettuce and tomatoes from hungry wildlife. Believing that genetics and exercise would work for me as it did/does for them, I naively assumed that I would follow this same model of graceful aging.
Sure, I figured that I’d slow down a bit, but I didn’t see that as insurmountable. I had this hubris, a sort of sense of invincibility, and year after year there were no reasons for me to change that. I might get some aches and pains from overdoing it in the garden, but after a few weeks into the season I could keep it up without difficulty. Bending, stooping, digging, yanking, lugging, getting down onto the ground and up again – none of these were a problem; I could go outside any time and immerse myself in bliss.
Until now. Less strength in my hands overall plus “trigger finger” in two digits are one thing; I can work around these issues simply by working in shorter stretches and not overdoing. But now there’s a problem with my back that affects everything, i.e., all those things I just mentioned a moment ago. It’s not a muscular thing that will ease up if I just stretch enough and practice better ergonomics; it’s structural and will never go away. Months of physical therapy haven’t improved it. All I can hope is that it doesn’t get worse.
Of course, just because it gets a bit difficult, you don’t give up on something you love; you find ways to adapt—physically, mentally, emotionally. Things that I’m now doing:
• Using more containers
• Placing containers atop tables so they’re waist high
• Switching to super lightweight hoses
• Using more ergonomic tools, e.g., ratchet pruners, tools with cushioned grips
Charlie said that he will build me some raised beds for vegetables and herbs as soon as I tell him where I want them. Part of me wants to start him building right away. And part of me recognizes that this transition from a crouching/kneeling gardener to a standing one is a process. What I’m doing now is paying more attention to how I’m naturally changing what I do.
I’ve become aware of how my physical limitations affect my mood and how I think about things. For instance, I’m finding that I’m spending more time with flowers; I love the immediacy of them, their continuous colors and textures, as opposed to waiting and waiting for vegetables to be ready to harvest. I’m finding that as my attention is reined in from the whole, big yard, I’m focusing more on the little details, taking delight in the intricacies of individual flowers – and the insects that visit them – more than I have in a long time.
I’m also learning a new rhythm of gardening. Instead of going out for hours at a stretch and being able to step back at the end of the day and see how much I’ve accomplished, I’m doing little five- and 10-minute weeding/tending spurts. It’s not much, and I don’t get the same sense of big accomplishment, but I can still pull weeds faster than Mother Nature can grow them. It just takes more constant focus.
There’s one other thing that I’m doing: hiring out the bigger tasks. It definitely feels foreign to me, but I’m learning to think of this hiring-out as just another gardening tool, working on seeing it as wisdom.
Pam Baxter is an avid organic vegetable gardener who lives in Kimberton. Direct e-mail to pamelacbaxter@gmail.com, or send mail to P.O. Box 80, Kimberton, PA 19442. Share your gardening stories on Facebook at “Chester County Roots.” Pam’s book for children and families: Big Life Lessons from Nature’s Little Secrets is available on Amazon, along with her new companion field journal, Explore Outdoors, at Amazon.com/author/ pamelabaxter.