Plant With Me, Inc. On Long Island has had a great pruning and planting year and it’s not over yet. I know I haven’t written for some time but I am here and ready to tell all about the gardens and their owners like never before. I challenge all who read my writing to think about their own stories and how they helped or hindered in the process of creating the gardens and landscapes of your dreams.
As some may know I have been in business for over 10 years and have been physically challenged a number of times throughout those years. If it was a blown out lower back with sciatica, bi-lateral knee replacements, a stroke, ruptured bi-cept and or a ruptured hamstring, you can say I have been somewhat challenged. All the while my passion for plants, gardens, trees and the continued development of my own knowledge of self in the gardens has only grown stronger and more intense. This past year was a demonstration of that passion and my ability to share it with all those who became inspired by my vision of restoring and redeveloping their properties landscape value.
Restoring people’s gardens has been my focus for the last few years and I will tell you how I found my way. Those who know some of this will please forgive me, for I need to remind myself through the process who I am and where I have come from. Before I move too far forward let me introduce an idea that has been rattling around in my brain for the past 2 years and I have begun to understand it more and more. Many people can cut a plant, prune a shrub or tree and even plant something into the ground. The trick and talent is not the basic pruning or planting but the knowledge of how that plant will respond to the pruning and how in different environments the planting of things develop differently. There it is. That is one of my talents. I can see the future development of a plant as it is planted and pruned to become that which brings value to a property and it’s home owner.
Ok, how did I find my way? Not a simple answer from a not so simple man. I have always had too many things I was really good at but never great. My father and wife would beg to differ but in the end my perspective needed to be satisfied and that is how I saw it. Then one day I was given an opportunity to learn a new business in a new industry and I took it. I learned about being an arborist over a two and a half year period, took a state exam and poof, I was a New York State arborist selling tree and plant health care work for a local company. The rest is history because after becoming certified I developed a concept that would benefit homeowners that had the appreciation of gardens but didn’t have the time to manage them correctly. Plant With Me, Inc was born. Pruning, designing, restoring, developing, managing all things around your home that most would prefer someone else to care for. How much? When can it be done? OK do it, and peace of mind is created. There is a cost, but the maintaining of value and understanding, that someone else who actually knows how something is to be done is doing it or managing it is worth the cost.
I will back track for one brief moment and revisit the idea and value of having someone who knows how your landscape should develop, based on your needs and expectations. This last concept is critical to who I am and how I present myself. Not only do I restore, design and install but I have the ability to prune and help landscapes develop to their optimum potential and long-term value. This is such an important thesis that I can only hope everyone has the patience to journey with me. Gardens and their plants are beginning to shut down for the winter, store energy to survive the onslaught of cold winds, heavy rains and freezing temperatures. There are many things that we can do to prepare our gardens for their future journey. I will do my best, over the next few weeks, to write a basic roadmap through the many swinging garden gates that bring us into winter.
I look forward to your visits and hopefully your inputs, insights and garden stories to enhance my life as I try to enhance all of yours. Please know that I will begin writing the preface and first chapter of my first book starting in November. Some of those thoughts will come through these pages and I will be asking everyone for their opinions on some of my ideas. I hope to hear from all of you soon. Enjoy the remaining Autumn and don’t forget to put some bulbs, tubers and or corns in the ground, creating hope for the future. Peace to all.