The Unscripted Beauty of a Chaos
Or, learning to embrace my inner negligent deity, and let the deer handle the landscaping.
It’s been twelve days since I stood outside, armed with fifteen packets of seeds and a Ziploc baggie of dried-out treasures harvested from months of grocery produce. This wasn't my first gardening rodeo, but my previous attempts have been…well…humbling, to say the least. I suffer from a severe, and apparently chronic, case of “is that a weed?” syndrome – a debilitating condition that once led me to meticulously eradicate every single arugula seedling I had proudly sown, leaving my green thumb feeling black and blue.
That history of horticultural failure brings me to today, and to a particular patch of my yard that has become the bane of my (our) existence. It’s a relentless sun-trap, getting blasted from dawn till dusk. A patch of land so hostile it had previously only managed to sow weeds and English Ivy though piles of river rock and an ant colony that should have been a case study. As I stood staring at this hellscape one day, like magic, my ever-practical, farmer-neighbor appeared, assuring me this was the perfect spot for my food-growing dreams to finally flourish.
Naturally, like any homesteader/project manager, my instinct was to control the situation. So, I leaned in and planned. Oh, did I plan. My partner and I dug, we stared, and over countless morning coffees, we discussed irrigation, companion planting, and native ecosystems until the words lost all meaning. I even broke out the graph paper and a measuring tape, designing a space so perfectly orchestrated it would have made a landscape architect weep (with joy of course).
But all that scheming led only to a state of what the buzzy buzzworders call "analysis paralysis." The perfectly drawn-out plan on paper felt sterile and bland, a joyless chore I was already becoming an expert at avoiding. The more perfect the plan became, with its planting distances and trellis concepts, the more daunting it felt. So, after weeks of staring at our blank canvas of dirt, we arrived at a revolutionary conclusion. Our grand, meticulously crafted plan was to have no plan at all.
That’s right. We opted for a zero-plan-sum-game. Now, let’s get one thing straight – having "no plan" is, in itself, a plan. Kind of like motivation – you’re never truly unmotivated, you're just motivated to do whatever it is that you are or are not doing. With this more of a “fuck it” methodology, we uncoupled from the pressures of perfection. You know that nagging, “what about the resale value of your home” vibe. We leaned into this rebellion against the notion that every square inch of our lives – and yards – must be curated into a masterpiece. No offense to the Yardzen-style enthusiasts, but that level of control just isn't in my lazy-gardener DNA. My true ambition is simply to sit with my morning coffee and watch the birds, bees, and bunnies throw a party. If I can occasionally snag some rosemary without putting on real pants, that’s a win.
With this philosophy as my guide, I fully embraced the concept of the chaos garden. The term has been floating around the social ether for some time, and it snagged my attention because it felt so…me. I stepped into my new archetype as the benevolent/negligent deity of this small patch of earth – the source of life, death, and the occasional, accidental reincarnation. I set off on my pilgrimages to the Eastside Urban Farm and Garden store (my second home). Each trip resulting in a delightful hoarding of seed packets, complimented by my own frugal seed-saving from grocery store peppers and melons, all of which were ready to join the fray.
With my diverse collection of possibilities assembled, I took a quick trip to my other second home (Lowe’s) for soil and compost. Then the real fun began. I laid down a thin layer of soil and, with the unbridled glee of a toddler with a fistful of glitter, I threw all the seeds into the air. There was no rhyme, no reason, just a chaotic jumble of potential and a little bit of dancing. And with a final, gentle sprinkling of compost, a blessing of the finest hose water, and that was it. I had surrendered.
So, what of this surrender to complete disorder? As of this posting, the chaos is thriving. I have sprouts. Lots of them. I think I can identify sunflowers, maybe some chives, possibly a zucchini leaf. They’re all just hopeful green squiggles at this point, and I find the mystery of it all completely captivating. I love watching the birds hop around, feasting on whatever I’ve offered. Our resident baby deer twins, whom we’ve affectionately named Ronald and Reggie, immediately mowed down what I believe were the cantaloupe sprouts. The kitchen carrot tops? Another favorite of the Kray brothers.
To add to the delightful anarchy (this should have been in the cookbook), I’ve moved our bird feeders into this section. The seed they fling with wild abandon will surely find a home in the soil and grow into something…maybe. Or nothing. Either way, it’s not my problem. Do I know what I’m doing? Absolutely not. But my track record for blissful ignorance is fairly solid, so I'm leaning in. I know there are rules and a million blog posts about the “right” way to do this, but I was aiming for low-cost, easy, and, most importantly, peaceful.
And that's exactly what this chaos has brought. The unscripted beauty of it all is a daily reminder to savor the stillness, to find joy in the unfolding of something I have very little control over. It’s outside, it’s feeding an ecosystem, and it may or may not feed me. In that release of expectation, I’ve found a profound sense of calm. I just get to watch nature take its course, one messy, unknown sprout at a time.
