For as long as I’ve had a garden, which is now 6 years, I’ve spent every second I can out here. In late winter, when the ground is covered in 5 feet of snow, I plow through masses of white seeking a spot in the sun to enjoy my coffee. Wrapped in blankets and winter boots, I stare at the barren ground for weeks in joyful anticipation of the first spring bulbs and then again in early November, I sit here soaking in the last warmth in the air, watching bees flock to the brick-red stonecrop as all other flowers have withered and collapsed into sad masses of brown. The reason for this obsession is very simple, through every season, every event and every aspect of nature, I feel the presence of spirit. There is no miracle greater than a tiny seed turning into a giant tree, the incredible variety of colour, fragrance, shape and form of plants and animals, and the ingenious ways in which different forms of life co-exist. It’s not difficult to understand how animism, the belief that everything in the natural world is infused with soul, came to be the first human religion. Animism is still alive and well in many indigenous societies, native American peoples sometimes refer to the plant and animal kingdom as “all my relations” and I love this concept. A mountain is not a big dead rock, it’s an old wise creature, a tree is not merely a sculpture of wood and leaves, it is a mother and a teacher. The birds, rabbits, racoons, squirrels, bees and butterflies are not alien species that we can’t communicate with, they are children of the earth and our brothers and sisters.
Animism is deeply rooted in geographical space. A stretch of land with its specific flora and fauna shaped the beliefs of human cultures and civilizations that developed on it. Homesteads, lakes, mountains and woodlands all had their invisible populations of spirits. The first temples were forest grooves, open fields and caves.
From time immemorial up until about 20 years ago, geography was a central factor in the lives of human beings. On a grander, geopolitical scale it still is, or some people would like to believe that it is, but the fact is that the internet changed all of that. It created a giant monoculture, a virtual global village, liberated from distance and time. You no longer need to be in a specific place to do a specific thing, you just need to be in front of your screen. What this means for the evolution of our psychology as a species remains to be seen, but some things are abundantly clear. People are not going to give up on their historical identities, even if those identities are now often nothing more than mythology. On the contrary, the more culturally dissolved and diluted the world becomes, the deeper we yearn to connect with stories, beliefs and places that used to make up our identity.
The emptying of meaning of place on a grand scale – cities, countries and continents all succumbing to the force of a dominant digital monoculture, marks the end of an era, and in a sense, the end of the world as we know it. At the same time, the rediscovery of place on a micro-scale, which can be observed in the trends of cottage core and backyard homesteads, the renewed attention to our own homes and backyards as places of significance – of power and healing – marks the beginning of something new: we’re taking the first trembling steps on the path to orienting ourselves in this wondrous natural world anew.
Nature and Culture
Since I moved to Canada, I’ve struggled to connect to anything “Canadian”. Apart from the native American minorities, there isn’t really anything in the way of life here that differs from the values, lifestyles, and customs of the global liberal democracy that I experienced in Europe. But many of the trees, wildflowers and weeds, the stones and minerals, mammals, birds and insects that grow and live here are completely unique to this place. They are expressions of the spiritual essence of North America. They shape the stories and characters in the indigenous mythologies; they carry magic and healing powers. They are key features in this country’s national identity and cultural imagery.
Canada have produced great plants men and women, such as the priest, Quebec-nationalist, and first professor of Botany at Université de Montréal, Frère Marie-Victorin. In the early 20th century, Marie-Victorin became fascinated with the new science of botany and fused his research with a passion for strengthening Quebec’s cultural identity. He believed that understanding your natural surroundings is fundamental to knowing who you are and worked tirelessly to discover and teach the flora of this vast region. In 1935, he published all his field work in Flore laurentienne, a new, poetic inventory of Quebec’s flora. Marie-Victorin also created Montreal’s botanical gardens, a treasure trove of beauty and inspiration, which are still continuously expanded.
Forest ecologist and University of Alberta professor Susan Simard grew up in a family of loggers and her love of dirt and forests drove her to pursue a research career. We still know very little of the world beneath our feet, but Simard figured out the role fungi play in building great underground networks through which trees gain awareness of their surroundings and communicate with each other. She discovered that trees live complex lives and organize themselves in societies much like we do. Trees take care of each other, respect each other, and heal each other. Simard reminds us that these ancient creatures existed on this planet long before us. In a sense, they created us, and we are completely dependent on them to cycle water, purify air and store carbon dioxide. Her poetic biography, Finding the Mother Tree (2022), tells the story of her groundbreaking research and championing of climate issues in a time when the forest industry was purely driven by profit.
I also believe that an important part of modern paganism is to evolve our understanding of nature, not just by learning about the magical lore and medicinal properties of individual plants, but by acquiring a deep understanding of the great ecosystem of nature – how plants and animals communicate, how they work together, how we as humans need to function within this system not outside of it, and to practically apply this in our lives. For me, creating my garden is the deepest expression of my spirituality and for much of the year, my magic and spiritual work is tending the garden.
Re-Connecting with All my Relations
A garden can be so many things. My garden is a place of botanical experimentation, an all-encompassing study of the climate, seasons, soil, plants and animals that make this place special. It is part forest, part farm, cottage, wildlife and monastery garden, with the odd topiary and stone sculptures of Greek nymphs thrown in as a nod to the traditional English garden – and the modern pagan movement that originated in Britain. It is a work of art, a painting that I co-create with mother nature, and it is also a journey through human history. Many medicinal herbs, bushes and ornamental flowers have been cultivated in gardens across the globe for millennia. The Romans grew Calendula, Chamomile and Rosemary for their culinary and medicinal properties. Medieval monks and nuns revered the rose as a symbol of the Virgin Mary and adorned their monastery gardens with this fragrant beauty.
Learning about and spending time with the unique flora and fauna of this land roots me in place and creates a deep sense of belonging that is very different from the belonging one feels in relation to other human beings. A lot of people feel lonely in our world, and society tells us that the main issue is the lack of human interaction. But it’s so much more, it’s the lack of interaction with the plants, animals and places of this world, the seasons and the weather, sky and sea and the spiritual forces embedded in this great mystery that is planet earth. We need to pay more attention to “all of our relations” as the Native Americans would say.
How can I turn this into a gardening philosophy? By planting native (region-level native) uncultivated trees, bushes and flowers as far as possible. It is simply the best way to serve the local ecosystem and this approach has required some reprogramming of my aesthetic senses. I need to move away from using cultivar plants that have been bred to look exceptional but lost all their pollen and nectar (and often scent) through this process, as well as exotic plants that local wildlife don’t like and that might be or become invasive and threaten the survival of native species. I want my garden to become one big green, living temple, an ongoing act of love and service to the ecosystem that sustains us all. The garden is still very much a dream, a work in progress, but working with it, tending it and enjoying it has deepened my experience of life beyond anything, even art. There is just nothing in the world of human imagination that compares to the divine creation that surrounds us.
Everyday Magic 