Three years ago tomorrow, I wrote my first blog entry and
Garden Gallivanter was born. I wanted to post this today, since I’ve woken
before the break of daylight to drive down the bumpy mountain road (yes, all by myself!) and catch the only bus
from our darling mountain village to Nice to practice some yoga at a local
studio; and now at a wine bar for un petit
verre du vin rouge and fast Internet connection. Tomorrow we’ll be in Grasse at
another marché, so I didn’t want to miss the chance to wish Garden Gallivanter
a Happy 3rd Birthday!
I remember having had this idea I’d been itching to scratch,
to create a space where I could reflect on my then new gardening adventures. I
wanted to create a portfolio of my work, to map out all the places I was going
to make better, more beautiful, and maybe even inspire others out there along
the way, to garden, cook, travel, to try something new. I didn’t know where it
would take me or where I would take it, but after 3 years, I’d say we’ve
covered some good ground.
This Garden Gallivanter has enriched the soil and unearthed
a passion for teaching kids how to grow food and community in the inner city,
seeing another side of Los Angeles she had never known. This was where it all
started.
Meanwhile, she created a garden in the backyard of a new house
for the one closest to her heart, her mom. Through that project, she found
peace with a new meaning of home, understanding that now it just meant two
houses to call home instead of one.
Then she followed her heart to Montana and saw for herself
what “amber waves of grain” meant, those words she had sung so many times
during Elementary school. And there she learned what hard work really was and
how a family farm looked like. There she dodged mosquitoes in the torrid heat of
July while harvesting peppers and tomatoes. There she harvested, packaged and
delivered organic produce to people and markets, driving through Big Sky
country. There she saw how magnificent heritage turkeys look like with their
red and blue colors. There she felt what tired really felt like and raced
against unexpected rain showers, harvesting as many onions as possible into a rusty wheel barrow before the first drops hit her forehead, and when they did,
running full speed to the barn, the wheel barrow bumping along, where she
braided the onions to hang and dry.
It was a glorious summer, but LA called her home. So she
returned and landed an unimaginable gig as the Edible School Yard GardenTeacher at Larchmont Charter School. She felt like she’d been working to get
someplace like this. There she cultivated many hearts and taught some
incredibly phenomenal kids and their families how to love and respect the
garden and all the food it gives us. And they taught her more about all of the
above and more, yes more. There she revitalized a Garden Program and discovered
pure joy. There she dug for rollie
pollies and watched the metamorphosis of Monarch butterflies with her
gardeners. There she felt valued and loved for not only her work, but her
essence of being. There she found her calling and discovered that doing what
you love and paying the bills with it is
actually possible.
All the while teaching the importance of composting, lady
bugs and selling Meyer lemons at the Garden Stand with her kiddos, this Garden
Gallivanter discovered an amazing group of other gardeners and studied
alongside her fellow comrades to become an LA Master Gardener. Over summer, she got to go up to Berkeley to
the Edible Schoolyard Academy, see the first Edible Schoolyard, say hi to Alice
Waters again and meet some even more awesome Gardeners and Educators from all
over the world.
After two amazing years of being Ms. Tiffanie Tangerine, a
new wind swept up this Garden Gallivanter and took her to France. There she
wwoofed, tasted raw lavender honey straight from the hive, under her bee suit,
amongst a sea of lavender in Provence. Oh all the things she tasted: raw sheep's milk while herding sheep with Marie and Samuel, Nicolas' cheese on the daily, wild mushrooms sautéed with Sarriette, discomfort, yes, even the bitter taste of discomfort. In the French Alps she learned how to drive a manual 4X4 truck up the mountain and down the
mountain; how to catch the bus; how to sleep in cars, on floors, under trees,
in J9s, along the coast, the highway, on a mountain top. There she
discovered a different kind of love, of struggle, of missing home, of the
tears you can only cry when lifting a really
heavy bee hive, wet, cold, your fingers almost breaking off, your feet slipping
on the gravel, under the pouring rain and thunder…of the gratitude you can only
feel when taking a hot shower after 10 days on the road, of learning how to
wait, of erasing old boundaries, drawing new ones, re-drawing erased ones, of learning
to be without so much and still being….
Santé to all the adventures had, all of them, the ugly and
beautiful, to all the wonderful people along the way, who have shaped this
blog and my soon to be 27 years of life right on Thanksgiving next Thursday, by
the way ;) and to those of you on the other side of this computer screen,
reading and ready to catch the next wind with me. Thank you for being there.
*Photo by Tiffanie Ma
Such a triumphant moment to be able to look back on this journey that you forged for yourself and appreciate all the aspects of it (the ugly AND the beautiful) for what they are. You, my dear, have lived by age 27 more than many live their entire lives! Happy birthday to you!
ReplyDeleteAuntie Valerie!!! Thank you for such an enthusiastic comment :) And, thank you for being one of those people on the other side of my computer screen cheering me on. Love You!
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