The Garden Doesn’t Ask You To Be Okay. It Just Asks You To Show Up.
An Ode to Gardening Through The Grief.
There are seasons in life that break us open. Grief comes like winter—uninvited, heavy, and cold. Even when the daffodils are in bloom, the birds are home and Spring has officially sprung. It slows everything down and in that stillness, the garden waits.
When I found myself in that slow, grey place, I didn’t set out to heal through gardening. I just needed something to do with my hands. Something quiet. Something alive. I started with kitchen scraps—banana peels, onion skins, coffee grounds—things I would have thrown away in another life. I dug small holes in the soil and tucked them in, letting the earth take what I couldn’t carry.
Direct composting became my way of staying present. It was simple: dig, drop, cover. No need for a fancy bin or a long process. Just a quiet offering to the soil. A reminder that even waste has worth. That decay is not the end of the story.
Over time, those buried scraps began to change the soil. I didn’t notice it at first, but it grew darker, looser, richer. And something in me started to shift too. Grief didn’t go away, but it softened. It had a place to rest.
When the ground thawed, I planted seeds. I had no big plan, just a handful of things that felt comforting—radishes, lettuce, zinnias. I pressed them gently into the soil, covered them with compost, and waited. Each little green sprout was a reminder: something is still possible. Life continues, even when you don’t feel ready for it.
I built garden beds slowly. One at a time, with reclaimed wood and reused bricks, piecing things together like a puzzle. Some raised, some in-ground, some just mounds of compost-rich soil held in place with straw. They weren’t perfect. But they held space for something new.
There’s something powerful in shaping a space with your hands. In turning grief into a garden. In watching the things you once discarded become the nourishment for something beautiful.
Healing isn’t fast. It’s not linear. But it happens, quietly, like roots growing beneath the surface. The garden doesn’t ask you to be okay. It just asks you to show up. To tend. To notice and in that slow tending, something inside begins to mend.
If you're carrying grief, you don’t need a plan. Start small. Bury your scraps. Plant something. Build a bed from whatever you have. Let the earth hold you while you heal. It knows how to take pain and turn it into growth.
We are not separate from the soil. We are part of the cycle and in the garden, nothing is wasted—not even sorrow.
A small ode to the grief that’s sitting heavy in our hearts. If it’s recent or if time is trying to heal it, I hope this brings some peace to your day
💚