My mom is not impressed with the whole idea of lockdown. We stay about 150 kilometres apart and visited for a few days before the lockdown began. We returned home a day before lockdown. She was emotional and I didn’t know how to make her feel better.
Being a photographer, I often frame the things that I see with invisible frames, so as I was looking at my mother, my focus changed to a big shrub outside the window and it gave me an idea.
Side note: One of my personal lockdown projects is to create an inviting picnic area in our garden. Over the past few months I’ve hoarded various items that I’d like to use in this area, and it’s already been taken out, ready for whatever the next step will be.
Seeing the big bush outside, I asked my mom if I could please have some of its branches, as I need it for a wreath that I’m planning. We went outside and started walking through her garden. This is something we do quite often, because we love seeing how her plants have grown. Each plant has its own story: from the one she got from her neighbour who knows how many years ago, to the one she planted when it was the size of her little finger and which is now starting to take over the garden.
When we go somewhere and there’s a plant that she likes, she will ask the owner if she may please have a small piece of it. She then takes it home and nurtures it for a while and soon I get my baby version of it too. We love sharing our plants. Sometime hers multiply while mine slowly die and sometimes mine will easily grow while hers take a blow, but I’m sure her fingers are much greener than mine!
As we picked the branches, she decided that I needed more plant varieties, so she started digging out another one here and another one there. It is mostly water-wise plants. So many of them are succulents with thorns and as she took it out of the ground, the thorns did what they were suppose to do and she ended up with a few scars.
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The more she dug, the more I was giggling, because the thorns in her hands kept multiplying as she just kept going. Some plants were quite anchored and we needed a bit of muscle to get it out, so we could just see one of us loosing grip, ending up on our backside… My mom is 74, so ending up on her backside is not really an option.
We were making jokes and laughing, almost like two little girls. I could see that her frown was turning upside down and for a moment I wished that we could press a pause button: water restrictions have taken their toll on the garden, but there we were; in one of the driest but most prosperous gardens I’ve ever seen, not only filling the bag with plants, but also filling our hearts with memories.
I’m no DIY queen, but it doesn’t matter: I can’t wait to start the wreath and I can’t wait to put the plants into my garden. What I look forward to most is involving my mom in the whole process. Just because we’re apart and in lockdown doesn’t mean that we can’t still do things together and not share in each other’s day-to-day activities.
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I will be asking her advice and I will be sending her photos. Not because I have to do it, but because I strongly believe in the anonymous quote “Just because I’m alone, doesn’t mean I’m lonely” and because we can still do things together, even though we’re apart.
May I encourage you to please reach out to people who need just a quick “hello” message or a brief “are you okay”. This lockdown thing is new to us all and we’re in it together. There are many people who are not okay, all though they seem in control. Soon the novelty of lockdown will wear off and people will start feeling alone, frustrated, unsure, etc… day seven, day twelve, day sixteen… other people will be needing your compassion and by sharing a little bit of yourself, a mere five minutes, you’ll be amazed by what will be deposited back into your own heart.
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Walking in the garden with my mom took barely twenty minutes, but it had a lifetime’s worth for both of us.
I will be sharing me and my mom’s plant project with you, so let’s hope all goes well
