My Mother’s Garden

This story was written by Jennifer Donahue, a student in my writing class at the University of Washington Extension during fall 2006.

This is the first piece I've posted on my blog that was written by someone else, but this one just HAD to be here. I think writing it gave Jennifer an outlet for her grief over the death of her mother. And I know that my writing about cancer has helped me cope with the ups and downs of my illness for the past eight years.

By Jennifer Donahue

I don’t know why people always think they know how I should feel. Whether I’m falling in love, losing a job, or losing my mother, everyone has an opinion on what my feelings should be.

Take grief. You’re “supposed to” go through stages: denial, anger, depression, and acceptance, according to pop psychology. Like it’s some sort of 12-step program and then you graduate.

The problem is that grief doesn’t really work that way, at least it didn’t for me. It doesn’t exactly follow a tidy path. Grief isn’t neat; it’s messy.

I know this because my mother died six months ago. I can’t tell you which stage of grief I’m in, because I’m so tangled up in a web of emotions I can’t separate the strands. Sometimes I go through denial, anger, depression, and acceptance all in the same hour.

Sometimes I’ll think I’m wallowing comfortably in denial (and happy to be there, thank you very much), when a flash of white-hot anger will shoot through me. Or I’ll think I’m starting to accept my mother’s death and something–a note with her handwriting on it, her gardening tools left on the deck—will bring me to my knees.

That’s what happened last weekend when I tried to clean up my mom’s garden. Everything was dead or overgrown, and the weeds and blackberries were creeping into the empty spaces.

I have been putting off this particular chore for a while now. My mom worked so hard on the garden this spring, and when she was too tired to dig she would sit on the deck and direct me.

“Put the salvia right in the middle,” she said. “The hummingbirds will like that.”

I couldn’t bear the thought of undoing all that effort.

The first thing my mom did when she moved to Whidbey Island, Wash., from Virginia in the spring of 2005 was dig up the lawn and put in a flower garden. That fall she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. The garden took on a new significance.

As the spring of 2006 came, my mom seemed obsessed with working on her garden. She put in plants that would have meaning for me–strawberries and rhubarb to remind me of her pies, and forget-me-nots (a not-so-subtle message).

She didn’t live long enough to bake me a strawberry-rhubarb pie, one of my childhood favorites, but I found her recipe. I think I’ll make one for my children.

My mom planted peas, determined to spend her summer eating them right off the vine. She planted flowers–cosmos and lilies, penstemon and lupines--so her garden would be, as she said, “a riot of color.”

And it was a riot of color–bright purples, reds, and yellows. It grew like crazy, getting brighter and more alive each day, as my mom’s life started to slip away. She was dying, and it seemed that as her energy ebbed the garden thrived.

By June, the garden was full and lush. My mom was thin and weak, but still herself. She’d been distilled down to her purest essence.

Birds visited by the hundreds–we counted 26 separate species, sweet little wrens and goldfinches, swallows doing aerial acrobatics. My mom and I spent more and more of our time on the deck, just watching the garden buzz with life. Hummingbirds got so used to our presence that they would hover close enough to touch.

We were quiet in mom’s garden; there really wasn’t much left to say. My mom had only days, maybe a week left to live, but she still wanted to be outside near her garden every day. Her peas ripened just in time for her to enjoy one, and from her smile it was the most delicious pea she’d ever tasted.

My mom worried over the garden, wondering whether we’d remember to water it, hoping that the blackberries wouldn’t take over. But I think she was really worried about us.

From the day she was diagnosed, she refused to admit a fear of death, but she did admit being afraid of what her death would do to her family. She wanted to die at home, but she thought the burden would be too much. “I don’t want this to ruin you,” she told me.

When my mom fell into a coma two days before she died, we angled her bed toward a window. We moved the bird feeders so that if she did open her eyes, she’d be able to watch the birds.

She didn’t open her eyes again, and the birds stopped visiting.

After she died, I did all the things you’re supposed to do, going through the motions but feeling like I was under water. My stepfather moved back to Virginia. I took care of paperwork and phone calls.

My brother and I kept my mom’s house, and every time we visited this summer the flowers were thriving, a vibrant reminder of her life. We spent hours in the garden, tending our memories as we tended the flowers. But as fall came, the flowers began to fade and wither.

I realized that as long as the garden was alive, in some way my mom was, too. Whatever grieving I avoided all summer was creeping into the corners of my mind, just as the weeds and the blackberries were invading the garden.

I couldn’t ignore it anymore. I decided to face my grief and face the garden. Tears streamed down my face as I pulled out snapdragons and yanked up weeds. I wiped my eyes with my dirty hands, leaving streaks of mud across my cheeks.

I cut back the perennials, praying that they’d come back in the spring. I left bare wet earth. It was no longer the garden my mom had poured her heart into. I felt her loss more acutely than ever.

Now I am trying to think of that bare patch as the promise of a new garden. It may not be the garden my mom planted in the spring, but it will always have her in it.

Every time I look at the “riot of color” or dig my hands deep into the earth, I will know that she is with me. And when the flowers come up in the spring, I know that they will bring a knot of emotions with them. Denial, anger, and depression, yes–but maybe acceptance, too.

@ Jennifer Donahue 2006. All rights reserved.

Comments

[Jeanne]

This is the first piece I've posted on my blog that was written by someone else, but this one just HAD to be here.

Jennifer is a student in my writing class at the UW Extension, and she wrote this story for class.

I love it for a lot of reasons: She is questioning the so-called stages of grief; she is honest about her own grief over the death of her mother; and her mother was a gardener, as am I--although I don't think my garden has ever looked as spectacular as the one Jennifer's mother created on Whidbey Island, just a ferry ride away from Seattle.

Jeanne

[Lynne Dahlborg]

Jeanne - Beautifully written by your student, and very moving. For those of us with life threatening cancer, it also resonates with a possible future for our loved ones. And, as a gardener who loves a "riot of color" in a summer garden, I appreciate the word picture created, memories of summer and the beauty of flowers growing and birds visiting. Thank you so much for sharing this.

[Joan Bitz]

I also have pancreatic cancer and am a gardner, wife, mother, daughter, and grandmother. My feelings when I read the story could almost fit for my family. I live in ND.

[Jennifer]

Joan, thank you for your comment. I wanted you to know that I just came back from a pancreatic cancer event in Washington, DC where we lobbied for more research funding for PC. You are in my thoughts and prayers.