Life’s a Garden…No Really, It’s Exactly the Same as Growing Plants

We jokingly say that growing plants for a living will prepare you for anything in life, but after being through half my life, I still haven’t found a better analogy for pretty much anything. As a professional plant grower, you start with a seed or a cutting with the hope that it will grow big and beautiful—and make you enough money to do it again and add a few more plants. Like your job, it takes showing up every day. It takes daily maintenance—water and fertilizer—to help it grow. It takes patience and time. And like your job, if you neglect something, you might only have small problems at first, but if you let it persist, that job will end—and your plant will die. Everything is forgiving… until it’s not.

Like your job, as a professional plant grower, you often don’t see the beauty in the work. The benefits you get out of it. You turn something the outside world sees as beautiful into a product. When you’re surrounded by 100,000 petunias, it’s easy to forget that each color and variety is a work of art. At your job, you often lose sight of the big picture so you can focus on the task at hand. That’s how we get through the weeks and days. But if you have a good job—a job you love—you’ll have those moments. The ones where you snap out of the routine, take in all the good, and remember why you do what you do.

I can apply growing to everything I’ve ever done. My investing—it takes patience. Raising my daughter—growing her from a little seedling to a big, beautiful flower. My relationships—they take maintenance and fertilization to reach their potential. My home. My health. A healthy plant has a better chance of fighting off disease. My surroundings—because to grow, you need a great place to grow your roots. A place that has everything you need.

When you’re young, you don’t see this. But as you age, you walk into a new situation and think, “Oh, this is just like growing—I need to do this.” And it guides you to the right decisions. The analogies go on forever, but they work. When you run into a situation, think about what your plant would need. Think about what you put into your garden or your yard to make it what it is. It wasn’t easy. Sometimes you can buy your way into things. Other times, there’s no way around it but to put in the work. Preparing saves time. Good decisions save headaches. The garden is your guide.

Tip of The Day

Some Have Garden Walks, I Went on a Garden Run

I run pretty much every morning. Before retirement, it was always at 5:30 and in the dark. Now I can run a little later and see hundreds of yards as I go by. As a plant lover, I’m not afraid to stop and take pictures. I won’t go into backyards—but I’ve been tempted.

Today you’re getting a little garden diary of the great things I saw on my run yesterday.

Older gardeners know this plant, but many new gardeners aren’t familiar with it. Flowering Quince (Chaenomeles speciosa) blooms as beautifully as any shrub, with red being the most common flower color.

The downside—and the reason you don’t see it as often—is that it produces fruit. The fruit is fairly large and makes a good jelly, but it’s otherwise not particularly exciting. The plant can also grow rather large, reaching 6 to 8 feet tall.

This one has been trimmed hard—my guess is it's been maintained at this size for 30 years. In the last 10 years, some fruitless dwarf varieties have been introduced. They're nice, but they don’t have the same visual impact as the larger plant.

This one was 30 feet off the road and it still caught my attention.

This is the cruel joke Mother Nature plays on us every couple of years—the Magnolia freeze. If you’ve noticed, it usually affects the white Stellata Magnolia in the North because they are one of the first to bloom. Down South, it’s not as big of a problem.

In Zone 6 and colder, the saucer types tend to perform better. I love ‘Ann,’ which is a dwarf variety. Lennei and Galaxy are two other excellent options. The Yellow Butterfly Magnolia tends to bloom later, which helps avoid frost damage.

Speaking of which, I passed by a yellow magnolia as well. You can see it here in tight bud. Below is a saucer magnolia that’s opened a bit more—not enough to suffer major frost damage, but it did take a little hit.

Little-known fact: My "hobby" is taking pictures of front doors around the world. Sometimes, that world is just my own backyard. Doors say so much about a country, a home, and the people within—from the color and size to the placement of the lock and handles. I’m not sure why they fascinate me so much, but everyone has their thing.

I took a turn I don’t normally take and saw this beautiful door. I caught a shadow in the photo, so I’ll have to go back—but it’s definitely going to make my list of top doors.

This is a picture of a Catalpa that’s been growing in the Idea Garden (which I run by most days).

We all know how big a Catalpa can get (50 feet by 50 feet), but this one has been pruned this hard for at least as long as I’ve known it—pushing 30 years. It grows out beautifully and has become a centerpiece, pretty much a living work of art.

In Europe, this kind of hard pruning is pretty common. I’ve seen trees shaped into hedges all over the Netherlands, England, France—really across Europe. I think Americans tend to shy away from the upkeep and commitment it takes to keep something naturally large this compact.

I don’t recommend it unless you’re completely all in on pruning every single year. But if you are, the result can be something really special.

Iris blooms are some of the most beautiful flowers in the plant world—but for the other nine months, the plain green foliage is kind of blah. That’s why my favorites are the white (Iris albo variegata) and the yellow-and-green (Iris aureomarginata). This time of year, they stand out as much as anything in the garden and hold that beauty all year long. Add in the flowers, and the bang for your buck is right at the top of the list. I saw both kinds on my run today, and it reminded me—these are must-adds to any garden. And since they spread fast, you might even get someone to give you a few.

I recently picked up the new Meta smart sunglasses and honestly, they might be one of the best things I’ve bought this year. I got them mainly for running and walking around—being able to take pictures and record video without carrying a phone is a game-changer. But where they really shine is in the garden.

Walking through a garden with these on feels like stepping into the future. You can look at any plant and simply ask, “What is this?” and it’ll usually get it right. It might not always give you the exact variety, but it’ll nail the species—and sometimes even surprise you with the variety. You can even ask it how tall it gets, how wide it spreads, and other info you’d normally have to Google. It’s like having a walking plant encyclopedia in your sunglasses.

I got the transition lenses, so they darken in the sun just like a pair of Ray-Bans. Style-wise, they look and feel like normal sunglasses—not bulky, not techy. And the video quality? Fantastic. It’s so much easier to walk the garden and capture what you’re seeing without juggling a camera or phone.

They also handle podcasts and Spotify, which makes them perfect for long walks or mowing the lawn. And if I come across a sign in another language, I can just look at it and ask for a translation. It’s wild.

If you're into plants, tech, or just want to capture life hands-free, these glasses are amazing and I’m not easily amazed

If you like this newsletter, please share Botany.com with your friends. I’ll be doing one each week and the more the merrier. Have a great week. Make sure to keep moving, keep smiling, and be nice.



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