Q for You: What do you garden for?

I find that whenever I mention to anyone that I garden — in whatever way or context — they tend to respond with some version of: “Oh nice! Flowers or vegetables?” These obviously being the two things people think of when they hear the word garden. My answer is: I garden for greenness. I grow greenness, with a side of vegetables. Maybe the occasional flower, although here I find myself wanting to be more purposeful, both for myself and for the pollinators. But I’m primarily in it for making my surroundings as green as they can possibly be.

I had a friend in Florida (where I briefly lived and gardened) who would always say “You need some color” or “You need some flowers” and I was like, mm, do I? Look at all this lush greenness! I don’t really even do variegated greens. I do use varying shades of green (with a preference for blue-greens over yellow-greens) — and textural contrast, of course — to keep things from being a big kelly green blur. But I’m honestly not even opposed to that! For me, the more green the better and the more shade the better. So those are my primary focus.

I’m asking this “Q for You” (borrowing the idea and name from my previous blog) before I’ve told very many people this place exists, but with the hopes that I’ll hear from some of you already here and those who arrive over time. There’s no right or wrong answer — the beauty of gardening is there’s something in it for everyone, and we’re all drawn to different approaches and styles and outcomes — but I would really love to hear from you.

So that’s my first Q for You: What do you garden for?