¡viva el jardinero!

this morning i read this blog post by Adriana at Anarchy in the Garden.
the timing of it was almost eerie. turns out that while i have been standing over a pan of roasting tomatoes, having some type of garden existential crisis, there has been a "a small skirmish erupt[ing] among garden writers and bloggers on the internet"(www.gardenblogger.com) about ME. well, not me. my generation.

to be perfectly honest, at the end of my first full weekend of tomato duty i was in the kitchen wondering what exactly i was doing. i do not know anyone who happily forsakes their weekend to spend the day and night playing with their own weight in tomatoes. i read the blogs of people who garden, farm, cook and can—i have a handful of friends with their gardens and kitchens. regardless, at that moment i wondered if i was being a little nutty.

i wondered if i was embracing a passion or hiding from an experience. why wasn't i "simultaneously self-absorbed yet philanthropic, craves information and connectedness, but seeks out only self-referential sources, is materialistic, impatient and in search of instant gratification" (www.anarchyinthegarden.com)? and if i'm not—how would my contemporaries relate to me?

and then i stumbled upon Adriana's post and the can of worms it referenced and i thought, i'm not alone. i'm not the generational odd-duck. i putter in my yard, i putter in my kitchen, i experiment with recipes and like to watch the interactions of the plants and animals around me. i'm not a farmer and i am not martha stewart—i'm not a gourmet cook or photography student. i almost wish i was all of the above, but i'm human. i'm my own take on all of it. i'm amatuer. but i'm passionate.

i don't know what that makes me, beside happy.
the appropriate contemporaries will find me