Reaping the Harvest.

Today I went to one of Vancouver's oldest community garden, and spoke to the man who is "in charge" of it. For two hours, I sat and discussed at length the history of the garden, how it is functioning in the present, and what is ahead in the future. I'm saving a lot of the responses for my final editorial piece, but the most salient thing I discovered, was that as I was sitting on the soil ledge overlooking the garden, I was figuring out that everything I have read thus far, researched, and predicted, pales in experience to the real thing. I was "knowledgeable" enough, eloquent enough, perhaps even a little proud of what I had known prior to my encounter with a real garden. And what I learned, was I knew nothing at all, and that to sit and talk with a man that had seen such garden grow from nothing into what was before my eyes was like learning a new word: I had to spell it out, put it in context, learn meanings. I don't know why I was surprised as people came and went into the garden, checking up on their plot, but I was. It was like watching a mystery unfold, putting the pieces together, trying to understand, to reconcile all that I thought I knew, to what I was learning, which was infinitely more enriching. Upon exiting the garden, I felt like this city had just told me a wonderful secret, and felt the conviction that I need to let all who I can, in my limited capacity, in on this secret if only for the reason that it's just too good to keep to myself.

I'll be meeting with more community garden leaders in the weeks to come, which I look forward to so much. I feel sort of hard pressed for time, as this course is coming to a close, the final exam is coming up, and other obligations such as work (and play with the weather choosing to be gorgeous again), but it's nice to end this course on very positive experiences that extend beyond this computer screen, my printed PDF research papers, and a textbook.