When I think about gardening

I have been volunteering at a green house in our area. The last few days I have spent hours cleaning and dead-heading geraniums. I have never liked geraniums, now- even less, but at about hour 4 of dead heading, I learned something.


Geraniums make clusters of flowers which bloom over several days, They are actually quite pretty. But the lovely blossoms do not last very long and start to turn brownish gray in a few days- as most blossoms do. Here is what was so interesting to me: In the green house setting at least, if the blooms are left unpruned they develop botrytis, a fuzzy mold that is detrimental to the whole plant. Every petal that falls and lands on a leaf will begin to decompose and take the leaf with it. So this thing that was meant to be beautiful, if left alone, will destroy itself.

I picked off hundreds of molding and yellowing leaves and took the old blooms of as well, and here is where another lesson occurred to me. The geranium was created in such a way that if you trace the stem of a bud with your fingers you will eventually feel a small bump, bend the stem against the bump and the whole blossom will pop right off.  It was created to be prepared for pruning.

I'm standing over hundreds of geraniums and thinking, if I was in Narnia (no joke this is what i was thinking) the geranium would say, that hurts, why do you have to break off my buds, they are the beautiful part about me. And i would have to explain that the pain was a temporary and necessary part of the growth process because what was meant to be beautiful if left uncared for, unaccounted, would be hurtful.

Interesting too that the stem of the buds do make a small snapping sound when you prune them. Almost as if it is prepared, yet not ready- and needs to be broken to grow.

Made me think that beautiful things in my life that I chose to make more significant than God become botrytis because its beauty has left its proper context. It becomes a cancer that can warp and destroy. And so maybe God will take away some of the beautiful things so that I can grow and change, and grow some more. 

And sometimes I want to ask him why it has to hurt.