We Share What We Grow

Holly Hogan

February 2, 2018

In Robin Wall Kimmerer’s book, Braiding Sweetgrass, she discusses her garden where she plants The Three Sisters. The Three Sisters are corn, beans and squash. Kimmerer grows these plants with the intent to share them with others. She doesn't mind that she ends up sharing her garden with the wildlife, such as insects.

Like Kimmerer, I have a large garden in the summer. Last year, my squash plants took over their square patch and intertwined their vines through and over each other, creating a blanket of enormous leaves where mammoth zucchinis and yellow squashes got lost among the vines and dirt. I grew enough vegetables to harvest for my family, my grandparents and some friends. There were bruised fruits in the harvest that were left unwasted and given to the chickens to peck at. My big garden was being shared by all walks of life, like Kimmerer’s.

One day in particular, I had ventured out to the garden in the early light to see what I could get from my garden before the sun caused the leaves to wilt and hide the vegetables. I heard a rustling sound come from the back of the patch, close to the tall, wooden fence. Initially, I thought this noise belonged to a snake, and I was ready to run. Before, I took off barefooted to the back porch, I saw a pair of tiny, brown, oval-shaped ears sticking up from the zucchini vines. A baby bunny had been using my garden as her breakfast-nook. Instead of shoo-ing her out and scaring her, I let her be. She depended on my harvest, just like I did, and as Robin Wall Kimmerer says of her garden, “More than people are fed by this garden, but there is enough to go around”.(139)