Planting Seeds
Planting Seeds
Spring Equinox Reflections & Tending To Growth
I walk outside and snow is up to my knees. It’s hard to believe that the spring equinox will arrive on Monday when the sun sits directly over Earth's equator while heading north. After this pivot point of equal day and night, days will stretch longer here in the Northern Hemisphere and plants will, eventually, appear from underground, slowly emerging from the sleepy hibernation of winter. Queen bumblebees will wake from their winter slumbers in abandoned rodent cavities, clumps of grasses or piles of fallen leaves to search for nectar.
Inside, I have started seeds: medicinals like stinging nettles, marshmallow, and calendula. Vegetables like kale, lettuce, beans, okra and pumpkins. The pumpkin sprouts are rising quicky, really going for it. I keep promising them that soon, snow will melt, sun will reach earth, soil will warm and they can be free.
Pumpkins hold a special place in my heart. A halloween enthusiast, they were the first seeds I planted when I was a kid. I always loved the ritual and pomp of the fall, seeing the misty pumpkin patches in autumn and the orange glowing creatures on doorsteps. I entered Halloween pumpkin-painting contests and Amherst’s annual window-painting contest, where all the stores in town gave up their windows for Halloween-themed painting. I relished anticipating which store I would be assigned to, and spent weeks beforehand working on my design. I sketched and drew jack‑o’lantern faces, copied them onto my chosen pumpkins, and my mom and I carved away. Sometimes we took the seeds out and put them in the oven on low with a tiny bit of salt to roast them. When my mom asked what I wanted to plant in our garden, of course I chose pumpkins.
I remember going to the Hadley Garden Center to pick out the seeds and as soon as we got home, I planted them on a hill just to the left of our back door on Summer St. Every day after that, I walked out with excitement to witness their progress. Rain and sunshine took on a whole new meaning. I understood why our ancient ancestors prayed to the sun and danced to attract the rain.
One of the earliest known food crops in the Americas, pumpkins are believed to have originated in Mexico at least ten thousand years ago. A member of the Cucurbita family, which includes squash and cucumbers, pumpkin is one of the legendary “Three Sisters” of Native American agriculture. The Iroquois planted the three crops together, as they nurtured each other’s growth, and believed they were “guarded by three inseparable spirits and would not thrive apart.”
After a few weeks I began to see small sprouts. Then every day they grew a little more until huge leaves began to unfurl, flowers began to bud and open into star-shaped golden blooms. For pumpkin blossoms to bear fruit, they have to be fertilized by bees, which move pollen from the plant’s male flowers that produce nectar and pollen to the female flowers that offer higher quantities of nectar but no pollen. Bumblebees, honeybees, and squash bees are the most efficient pollinators of pumpkin. My little patch was a work of community.
And one day, when the work of the soil, sun, moon, rain, and bees was complete, beautiful orange pumpkins began to arrive. I was amazed that these small seeds contained all of the information needed to give birth to pumpkins. I learned early on that Earth is amply generous and completely magical, as long as we do our part to take care of and pay attention to her. By putting those seeds in the ground, I initiated the incredible collaboration between the seed and the soil, rain, sun, and bees that nurtured the pumpkins’ growth. We did it together.
Now, on the land that my partner and I steward, just 30 minutes away from my first tiny pumpkin patch, I will initiate this magical collaboration again. This time, with more wisdom but just as much wonder.
Plants can pace us and teach us. Planting seeds and connecting to the rhythms of nature can help us observe our own seasons of growth. Our bodies are living ecosystems, and like the cycles of nature, we also ebb and flow, go backward and forward, contract and expand, and move through necessary phases of growth, death, and restoration. True, tangible growth takes time, it is vulnerable and tender, a work of community and collaboration.
How can you nurture, water and tend to your inner landscapes as the weather warms and you begin to emerge?