"The garden, after all—or in my case, the week patch—is the ultimate extension of our personal self, far beyond how we decorate our homes. The house looks nice to our guests, but we commit ourselves to the world with statements we make in the garden.
'While I may in a legal sense 'own' the land in which my garden resides, I can only borrow it in a moral sense. I am therefore both a temporary custodian and a trustee of my garden for those who must someday live where I now dwell,' Chris Maser of Corvallis writes in his new book, The World is in My Garden: A Journey of Consciousness.
"Maser, 63, a consulting research zoologist and ecologist, is best known (to me, anyway) for his excellent reference work, Mammals of the Pacific Northwest, a comprehensive and scientifically pinpoint-accurate guide to the warm-blooded critters with which we share space.
"But unlike many other scientists, who spend their energy on their science and keep their own counsel, in this book Maser clearly and articulately applies his technical knowledge to his place in the world.
"And, happily, he shares his philosophy with coherence and forthrightness. He's been thinking about humanity's place in the natural order of things for as long as he's been gardening.
"This mildly esoteric book isn't for everyone, but everyone should read it....
"Stella Polaris, who reviewed the book for readers in the United Kingdom, said Maser simplifies the human experience by taking life's lessons from his garden, which is 'not just a metaphor, but a very real place.'
The applications are profound:
- "'Defile the ditch and we defile the stream, river, estuary, and ocean,' Maser writes. 'If, therefore, every gardener made it his or her sacred duty to clean and protect the soil of his or her garden, the world, through the humble ditch, would be cleaned in like measure.'
- "'I can no more protect the fish [gold, in a pond] from the marauding heron than I can keep the cabbage butterflies from laying their eggs on my vegetables, or the scrub jays from planting acorns amongst the flowers, or the robins from sowing holly trees seemingly everywhere through their droppings.'
- "'Keep in mind that as gardener, you and I not only design beds of vegetables and flowers with spade and trowel, wood and rock, but also determine the presence or absence of plants and animals in a particular place and time.'
"Maser, who grew up hunting and fishing, but does neither anymore, says he now has trouble killing even sowbugs—although he clearly accepts the roles of judge and jury in his own garden domain and, although his wife [Zane] is a vegetarian, he has no problem eating meat.
- 'Killing is a necessity of human survival on this tiny planet called Earth. That I must kill to live is therefore not the issue. The important point is that I must consciously, willingly understand, accept, and be accountable for the suffering I cause in the act of living.'
"True enough words for us all, be we hunter/gatherers, homeowners fighting off rats and mice, or even gardeners.
"Gardeners, Maser says, are charged with stewardship, but still have to decide what to plant—and then kill and eat."
Bill Monroe
Wild Things
The Oregonian
Portland, Oregon
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