The Garden of Substack - A Celebration of Community
How has Substack nurtured your feeling of belonging in motherhood?
“What if you finally saw
that the sunflowers, turning toward the sun all day
and every day—who knows how, but they do it—were
more precious, more meaningful than gold? -Mary Oliver
Welcome to the Substack “Garden” for Moms & Women
One of my favorite things about Substack is the way it unfolds like a community garden. It is a real, tangible space where we get our hands dirty in the soil together—can you smell it? I wash my hands under the cold, running faucet; wipe my hands dry (but not clean) on a dishtowel, smear some kind of herbal balm into my calloused hands, (look down at my blue nail polish - perpetually chipped); and prepare to write.
Here we are: growing ideas, sharing seeds, laying out plans. We water each other’s beds when someone is away, and raise up magical beanstalks that sparkle and shine in the morning light. We lift stones to make low borders, and build pathways to each other’s gardens.
In our plots, we cultivate sacred spaces that we fill with words, photos, and the noise of joyful, complex conversation, like birds atwitter in the branches or wind chimes wild in the night-storm. Gardeners sip coffee in one hand, and wield a pair of clippers in the other, offering a fellow gardener a bunch of fresh basil; a few cut stems off the fragrant pink rose bush…
What Will We Grow Together?
“I see your beanstalks, my friend, growing high on their poles. What kinds of rainbow beans dwell inside?”
“There are blue beans in my pods, and violet, and dark green ones. There are orange, yellow, magenta, and spotted-purple beans, too. Would you like some to plant yourself?”
“Yes, friend, I would! Thank you.”
We prune dead branches, too, revise our ideas, and make compost out of rotten things.
We know something about growth. We’re curious about death and resurrection.
Sometimes our kids run through this community, and we welcome them: a blur of color and playful shouts, knocking over watering cans and terracotta pots—playing tag or hide-n-seek. At other times our children emerge slowly, reminding us to do the same. They notice the praying mantis, solemn on the leaf; they hold the ladybug in the palm of their sweaty hand. At night, stars twinkle in a twilight sky, and the owl hoots wisdom somewhere close by.
Our community garden, our shared motherhood, is the smell of rain on the air, of moss soft beneath bare feet, of hot rocks with lichen and bees buzzing nearby. It’s faces—all kinds of faces, all kinds of women—gardening close by, intertwined yet separate; cultivating, yet sharing. This is ideal womanhood, this is the stuff of power. Of change. Of making the world a better place. Your hands matter.
…The Network is Bigger Than We Could Have Ever Imagined
Beneath the soil lies a network of the subconscious: an unseen net of stars, little compositions of fungi and white highways, rhizomes: it’s all of our energies connecting and inspiring and influencing one another in ways we cannot even see with bare eyes. Finally, in the fall, our leaves brighten tremendously and outshine even the lush, verdant green, frost laces the edges; and we collect the harvest of abundance—or perhaps, the harvest of little. No matter, we are here for one another. In winter we lay bare the sorrows of our bones, we cry together and offer warmth when the ground is frozen.
Our Creative Seasons Reflect the Cycle of Death and Resurrection In Our Own Lives
Late winter, small forsythia lift their little chins to a warming sun against a weakening gray palate: a promise of yellow, a promise of fragrance. We pull forth another year (with the help of each other’s sunshine and tears), flowering unimaginable ideas, sharing baskets of overflow. Of every imaginable color and texture, smell and taste, we grow. And grow and grow. We visit each other’s plots, bringing baskets and canned goods: jars of pickled asparagus and ripe tomatoes, saying “here, take one, try this,” and “thank you.” Because this is our community. -Kay
Please share your comments! How have your Substack friendships enriched your life?