Dear She Said, He Said community: We will not be hosting #shehechat tonight because of the holiday. We will return next week at our normal time of 8 p.m. CST on Thursday. Enjoy the holiday!
Yesterday, Jim talked about his view on maintaining the She Said, He Said community through curation. For the most part, I liked what Jim had to say in his post (except maybe the part where he swore). However, I do look at this community that’s evolved from our She Said, He Said venture in a slightly different way.
Surveying the Land
About a year and a half ago, I moved with my boyfriend from our downtown Milwaukee condo with views of Lake Michigan to a house in the western suburbs with a large yard. While I knew I was going to miss city living somewhat, I was excited about the idea of gardening and perfecting our landscape.
Unfortunately, timing was my enemy during our first year in the house. We moved at the beginning of summer and we weren’t really able to plant anything new. Still, I took time to make many laps around our new yard and survey what we had already in the ground. I researched how to maintain what we had and planned what we would add for the next growing season.
Coming Up Roses
Any gardener will tell you that you shouldn’t expect much during the first year. They will also tell you that there will always be a certain spot in the garden where the soil is rich and anything you plant there will grow like mad. The trick is finding that spot and cultivating it so that it can reach its full potential.
In that first year in the new house, I found that spot to be three different rose bushes entwined around a trellis near our front door. They weren’t blooming well that first year, but I saw the potential. I did some research, called a friend in landscaping and took proactive steps to help the growing process for the next year. As you can see from the photo, my time and effort in the cultivation process was rewarded well this year.
The Community Garden
This is how I see our She Said, He Said venture these days: It’s a community garden. Six months ago, Jim and I took time to step back from our blog posts and survey the land. We saw that what we had was the seedlings of a community and we talked about how to grow it into something special.
Our subsequent weekly Twitter chat was planted in the rich soil of the community garden. Through time and careful cultivation, it’s grown into an organism that builds upon itself and also enriches the original blog posts. Recently, it’s bloomed into live presentations of our venture and those are being tended to carefully as well.
As Jim noted in his post, it’s important to use curation to maintain what you have; but I think the beauty in building something is in the cultivation to help it grow into something even more beautiful. We value each person in our community garden and we’re looking forward to continue watching it bloom.