"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartanlike as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion." from Henry David Thoreau's Walden

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Intent to find a Purpose

Most students at Macalester College (the liberal arts school in Saint Paul, MN I attend) do not know that we have a vegetable garden. They probably also don't know they're allowed to work in it when they want, and would be surprised to learn that it provides some of the food at Café Mac, our one and only cafeteria.

I was one of few students who learned about the community garden within my first week here. That didn't inspire me to do anything with it. I was already VERY busy and never saw any postings about meetings... so the garden slipped from my mind. Come April of that same Freshman year, I found myself hired as the summer gardener. 

Why? Because community gardening matters, to put it simply. But why did I want to do this job? Because I'm an Environmental Studies major living in the school's EcoHouse next year. And I felt the need to spend the summer away from home. So here I am, in charge of a beautiful garden, nestled between the Spanish and German culture houses. 

What I would like this blog to be is a documentation of what I've been doing in the garden, and if I'm good about keeping it up, a documentation of what I'm doing in the EcoHouse next year. I'm sure that once I've gotten the hang of this whole blogger thing, I'll know what exactly what this is.
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