What I Learned about Gardening from my PhD in Computer Science
Several years ago, I moved into a house with a garden. Having always lived in apartments, I had never had a garden as an adult. I like having a garden, but I would not say that I like gardening, nor am I terribly good at it.
My PhD did help, though. As you might know, my PhD was in computer science, so it did not have much to do with gardens, or plants, or even sunlight.
But I learned mental attitudes, and ways of working, during my computer science PhD that proved helpful in the garden. Here are a few:
- Persistence is the most important thing.
- It’s better to do a little bit of work in the garden every day, then to try to do it all in one day.
- Find ways to measure small progress. Celebrate when you finish planting the small corner of one half of one eighth of your back yard.
- You need to make a plan before you start planting.
- Weeds can be pretty, but they don’t belong in your garden.
- Don’t take your plan too seriously. Sometimes plants start growing that you don’t expect. Sometimes the “volunteers” are exactly the plants that you need.
- You don’t make things grow. You create a good environment, weed and prune, and watch them grow.
- Some plants grow better in certain climates.
- Some plants won’t survive, no matter what you do.
- Wear suncreen.
A gold star for you if you realize that this blog is not really about gardening. (Except for the part about sunscreen. Definitely wear sunscreen.)