The Growing Addiction

by Ruth Moorhead,

State Horticulture Chairman, 2004

"Hello, my name is Ruth, and I am a gardening addict."

Likely, if you are reading this, you are familiar with the stages of this addiction. Sometimes it starts in the later stages of life, when, out of boredom, or new to retirement, one innocently looks for a change of pace, a dalliance, a different direction, something new to try. Perhaps you were first lured by large “sale” signs and you naively drove into that plant nursery, feeling fully in control, never thinking that a lifetime addiction was so very close, and laying in wait.

Mine started as a child. Yes, I got hooked by my father. It’s in the genes and goes back many generations, getting more and more concentrated with each one. For me, this addiction is total. Only occasionally am I in control, able to dally in other interests, but realizing that most lead back to the inevitable first passion.

This addiction that we perennially and fruitlessly fight, manifests itself in so many devious ways. For some, it’s newly tilled ground. You see it, smell it, and are drawn to touch it, crumble it in your hand, mentally taking in the moisture, friability, tilth, compost, “black gold”. (Oh yes, we have our jargon. Other addicts face words like “booze’, “crack”, “weed”, “sugar”, and “carbohydrates”. We know weed and crack, but they don’t mean the same thing for our type of addiction.)

For other garden addicts, their “habit” involves paper: catalogs, landscape magazines, gardening books. And they must fight an additional side effect - clean and organized storage, in the house no less.

I recently rediscovered the temptation that I cannot fight against. There I was in Menard’s, two day’s after Christmas, headed for the electric snowflake lights, when out of the blue, this kiosk from Burpee’s took my total attention.

The timing was jarring, too early, I thought. My defenses were down. I wasn’t prepared to see the object of such intense craving, there, totally disrupting my chain of thoughts and actions: a display of freshly unpacked, 2004 seed packets. And marked at 50% off.!!

Gone was my plan for Christmas bargains. In an instant, I was totally, hungrily, hooked again. I started at the top with basil and beans. Five types of basil and four kinds of beans started a pile in my cart. Untried varieties and old favorites stirred my passion. I eagerly devoured the descriptions on the back of each packet as I worked the displays from carrots to zucchini. Packet after packet joined the pile. After twenty minutes I finally tore myself away. Others had noticed the area and a swarm was developing. I’m not the only one.

I know I’m weak. Four seed catalogs await me at home and I know I will succumb again. Winter is just six days old, I’ve bought 35 seed packets, and the power of growing is growing once more. Oh that other such addicts can know such happiness.