I have an old Army arctic parka I wear when the weather gets cold. I bought it back in 1982 when I was a scooter-riding mod.

This parka went with me nearly everywhere for several years and then went into the closet for a long time. When we moved to the hi-desert where the winters are colder I got it out again, and now it’s my regular go-to jacket. I love my parka!

A strange thing happened about a week ago when I went to put on my parka to go out on the patio for a happy hour smoke… I reached into my pocket and found a marijuana seed. Let me explain why this is strange – I haven’t carried a baggie of pot in my parka since around 1984… so where did the seed come from?

Every time I bought pot back then, unless I was lucky, my pot had seeds in it. Sensimilla marijuana was always the hope but rarely my reality in the mid-1980s. Cleaning out seeds and stems was my reality. Could this seed be a remnant from back then? Very unlikely, but possible – if the seed was lodged in the lining of my pocket and finally worked its way free…

I’ve been wracking my brain trying to figure out where this mystery seed came from, and every possibility I could think of has turned into a dead end. I mean, it had to come from somewhere, right?! I don’t think God put it there… or did He? That’s what I’m down to at this point, old seed or God seed. 😉

I’ve been keeping the seed on the edge of my rolling tray, and every time I pack a bowl I look down at it and ponder it’s existence. Where are you from little seed? What strain are you? Are you even still viable?

I read that cannabis seeds can be stored for up to ten years, and that’s if you’ve paid attention to storing the seeds away from light in a low humidity situation. Well, considering our low humidity here, and the darkness of my parka pocket… hmmm – this seed could, on an outside chance, germinate?! I’m going to give it a try and see, because… why not?

Nature Or Nurture

Thanks to several people I’ve heard from since I wrote about my inability to grow good herb a week ago, I’m doing some re-thinking on my growing abilities – and my thoughts go something like this…

As I mentioned in my previous post, my family is not a plant-growing family. We just didn’t seem to have that skill set, and our yard reflected that. Sad to be the kid from the house on the block with the brown lawn full of weeds – but that was me.

This inability to grow things got into my head when I was young and once I had internalized it – well, I self-identified as a brown-thumb. I assumed it was some genetic thing that ran in our family. “Being a brown-thumb is in my DNA,” I would have said, up to a week ago.

But I’m not a brown-thumb by birth – I can’t be! There is no genetic trait for having a green-thumb or brown-thumb that I know of. That would be kind of weird, actually, when I think it through. What does run in my family is a strong avoidance to gardening, and this makes a huge difference.

I come from a book-loving family. Both my parents were extremely smart, and were happier in the house reading or studying than in the garden. They sent the kids out to deal with the yard instead… some of my chores growing up were mowing the lawn and pulling weeds, and I hated doing both!

Looking back, I can see I grew up in an environment which wasn’t conducive to introducing me to a love of gardening. When I thought of our yard as a child… it was a place where weeds grew, a chore to deal with, and something that kept me away from whatever childhood activity I really wanted to do.

So, when I think about the situation, it all boils down to nature vs. nurture. Was I born a brown-thumb, or did I grow up in a brown-thumb environment? I think the answer to that one is obvious!

So, now that I’m aware that my brown-thumb situation is because I grew up in a brown-thumb environment, I can change. I don’t have to be bound by my upbringing… I am, after all, still a learning and growing creature, and change is a part of the process. I can change anything about myself that is just a learned response to the world. I can nurture new responses in the garden of my mind.

The Art Of Growing

Rocky, a pepper reviewer, grower of CBD herb, and reader of this blog, dropped a comment on my post about growing herb and mentioned “Growing is a huge trial and error art”. An art?! Say no more!

I’ve been making art for over three decades – I’ve painted hundreds of paintings, made more collages than I could ever count, built sculptures and assemblages, handmade word-collage books and sound-collage recordings – endless amounts of art! Heck, I’ve even been called an artist once or twice. 😉

I believe art is about a love for the process while working towards a sublime result. In my previous growing experiences I considered the process a burden… my childhood coming back to haunt me. I just wanted the results. Crazy I didn’t think of this earlier.

And if growing plants is an art, well, I should be able to learn that art, given enough time. My, that gives me hope! I’m going to approach growing herb in a whole new way, as an art I need to learn, as an art project. I’m gonna turn my brown thumb green! 🙂 And I’ll start with attempting to germinate the mystery seed…

Until tomorrow, best of health.

PS. Germinating tips? Drop them in the comments!

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