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My Garden Is My Healing Space
Digging, seeding, planting, and watering nourishes my spirit in surprising ways
Wandering in my garden is how I greet my day. Winter. Summer. Rain or shine. It’s where I go to meet the spirits of my female ancestors in the woods behind the house. It’s where I go to discover what miracle of nature has occurred overnight. It’s where I go to heal. It is part of my process. Didn’t take a meeting to figure it out. Didn’t consult the spiritual books and tweets. Didn’t even call on my Mother spirits to guide me to my healing place.
They already knew what I needed and how to lead me there. By the time I realized what a restorative and healing place my garden was, I was already hooked. And my Mother spirits — I call them my Grandies — were already there. Waiting for me. Ready to lead me to the morning gardening routine that sparks my imagination, stirs my creativity, and prepares me for telling the stories that swirl around me as I stand, physically exhausted and powerful next to the towering Red Queen sunflowers.
Like most women of color in the South, I come from a long line of growers — some of their own volition, some by no will of their own. So many of us treasure memories of our elder women bent over at the waist or full stooping among their patches of earth pulling weeds or picking beetles…
