Pinteresting: My Visual Garden

"I, who cannot see, find hundreds of things to interest me through mere touch. I feel the delicate symmetry of a leaf. I pass my hands lovingly about the smooth skin of a silver birch, or the rough shaggy bark of a pine.... I feel the delightful, velvety texture of a flower, and discover its remarkable convolutions; and something of the miracle of Nature is revealed to me.

Occasionally, if I am very fortunate, I place my hand gently on a small tree and feel the happy quiver of a bird in full song.... At times my heart cries out with longing to see these things. If I can get so much pleasure from mere touch, how much more beauty must be revealed by sight.

Yet, those who have eyes apparently see little. The panorama of color and action which fills the world is taken for granted.... It is a great pity that, in the world of light, the gift of sight is used only as a mere convenience rather than as a means of adding fullness to life."

Helen Keller

This week I decided to do something I hadn't seen yet on Pinterest (although I'm making no claims to brilliance, I just haven't searched for any other people who might have had the same idea.)  I decided to go through my Gurney's and Henry Fields catalogs and make a "visual garden" of what I want to plant in our garden (which will also be different this year, thanks to the abundance of raised bed information on Pinterest).

It was beautiful and inspirint to see the greens, oranges, reds, and golds all in one space.  It almost made me think spring.  Except we have three more months of winter here.  Sometimes four or five.

I'm certain that in the spring, the visual promise of fruit for our labor will be fuel to keep on building those raised beds, hoisting the dirt, shoveling the manure, and planting the seeds.