Monday, June 27, 2011

The Promise of a Rose Garden

There's a song from the 70's that I don't expect you to remember since many of you were not yet born, but it's called "I never promised you a Rose Garden." Sometimes I consider what that phrase means, because well, I do promise a Rose Garden. The name of the Center was chosen for many reasons: my mother's name is Rosemary, the program emphasizes outdoor play and kindergarten (a German word) translates into Child's Garden. Besides, I love roses, how they look, smell, feel and even taste. Their beauty inspires me as it has many poets and writers in the past.

June is the month roses bloom in Buffalo and whenever I see them, it gives me pause. I know, however, they do not get that way without some effort. I've planted a few bushes and have learned what it takes to help a bush survive its first winter and then to produce red, velvety blossoms on its thorny branches. It's always helpful if the bush comes to me with a strong root system and I get it in the ground as soon as possible. When planting a rose bush, I build up a mound of compost-rich soil around it, water it if it gets dry and remove weeds or ground cover that tries to grow too close to it, and then I step back and watch, noting signs of growth or the need to cut back a dead branch (wearing gloves so to not get pricked by thorns), getting excited when buds appear and progress into blossoms that eventually drop their petals leaving the tight pink bulb that's called rosehips. It makes a delicious tea rich in Vitamin C.

There are three main factors involved in growing roses:

1. the root factor or the innate health of the rosebush
2. the care factor or how well it is tended (knowing when to step in and when to step back)
3. the miracle factor or how forces beyond our control make a thorny branch produce roses

Back to the 70's hit, it mentions "along with the sunshine, there's got to be a little rain sometime." Surely, it takes both sun and rain for a rose to grow. it seems to me that promising a rose garden is a promise of balance since beautiful roses grow on thorny branches. You cannot have one without the other. It represents life on life's terms, wanting the best but accepting and working with what comes, continually watering and weeding and watching.

Children come to us with their own root systems. At the Rose Garden, we tend, weed, water and feed nutrient rich food. Then we step back and await the miracle of growth and development that makes roses and children bloom, and we celebrate it.