#9 CONVERSATIONS* part two (revised 6/10) " what happened?"

Sarah thought about her search for the keepers of plants over the last ten years. Where were those little garden stores that had given her such pleasure and relief from the day to day pressures of her life?

Sarah. What happened to all those great little garden centers that were in almost every town and city in America?

Nick. Well, there are still a few of them left. The owners are holding onto this lifestyle and still loving what they do. But, most of the good ones have vanished. And all the reasons for them being gone have to do with the owners and their desire for a change. You know, we were young when they started, without two nickels to rub together, but full of ambition and dreams. We found a little spot along side a road outside of town, got out the hammers and paint bucket and made a beautiful place. It wasn’t the business expertise that made us successful. It was our eager positive energy that made it happen. Hell, we bought our little garden store for 27,500.00, the whole thing, business, land and building, the whole enchilada. We paid an extra 3,500.00 for all the inventory and fixtures. It was an old concrete block fruit stand with a couple of pop machines, a walk in cooler, and bunch of bug sprays and a toilet that sometimes worked. The years past, very fast and soon, too soon, many of us got old and ran out of energy or got sick or just got tired. We just could not pack around bags of fertilizer from dawn to dusk.

Our kids didn’t want it. Neither did any other kids their age. They were just not having any of this hard, long springtime life. They saw their moms and dads dragging home and dropping or falling asleep in the bathtub just beat. The kids wanted the comfort and security of the big company, the corporation. Funny thing though, after the little garden store was long gone and it was too late, the idea of packing plants and the springtime rush looked pretty good to them after all.

Yeah, there are lots of reasons why they gave up. They got really kicked in the teeth when the big stores all around them started selling plants and garden supplies big time. There just was not enough money to keep up with these flashy places and the big boys would slash the prices so much, it made their plants look expensive.

They would see the accusing looks on their gardeners faces as if their long time garden store guy was cheating them. It made them sad and angry. Some tried to match the prices and beat the big boys at their own game. They borrowed money to purchase a new sign, buy some new shelves and improve their places.

But at the end of the season, there was no profit dollars left for them to make it past the long winter ahead. Some tried other things to sell, a Christmas store, wood stoves, items for rent, but it did not work.

Sometimes a buyer would show up for the little garden stores. In a few seasons, the buyer was gone, the place was run into the ground and all that was left was a little down payment money and a huge mess to clean up.

And the gardeners changed in their towns and cities. Families were now in full tilt mode of survival with little time and less money to spend on any leisure time they had. The shopper who would visit the little garden store moved from the garden to the spa with their dollars. They wanted Pilates and massages and golf outings and tummy tucks. They sold the big house and moved into the condo. A little patch of lawn and a few pots of flowers is good enough as long as someone else took care of them.

The new young homeowners, the new customers of the little garden store, could not tell the difference between a marigold and a marshmallow and could care less about the whole gardening thing. Why would they go out of their way to find this little store when all they wanted was a few “flowers” and be done with it.

So this slide began slowly and then very fast down the slope. The one and only bright spot in this disappointment was the land. The land saved them. Remember, they bought the place cheap near the edge of town. Now the land was worth something and often a lot of something to a lot of buyers. The deal was made. The papers were signed. The tractors and dump trucks arrived. The little garden stores vanished all across America.

#8 CONVERSATIONS* part one (revised 6/10 ) "around the yellow table"

Around the yellow table

The Gulf Coast sun streamed down on to his bright yellow kitchen table and chairs that morning. Nick liked the color yellow.





In the old days, he bought little red radio flyer wagons for his customers to choose his plants and painted them all yellow. He even had a pair of yellow Chuck Taylor All-Star tennis shoes.

Nick and Sarah sat on the yellow chairs that morning surrounded by the gathered memories of his life as a “keeper of plants.” In a corner of the kitchen was a shelf of tools with little chains and wires that had some very important purpose in those days. The walls were filled with pictures of big loads of trees and racks of blooming flowers on a spring morning and smiling faces of proud workers

Nick had made this little shack against the Gulf water a home, surrounded by the life he loved. He poured coffee into the bright blue mugs and placed the worn leather notebook next to him.

They would talk until the sun moved over the water and finally into the horizon with the shadows following, lengthening across the yellow table. Sarah had learned about Nick Hudson. She had been told of his youthful successes and his final years in failure. She knew that he yearned for just one last shot at a this dream. The dream was in that little brown notebook.

Sarah talked about her career with the Harley-Davidson, her decision to leave that life and her love for gardening. She talked about her crazy idea.

She needed answers from Nick.



Sarah

Tell me about your life at your garden store?


Nick

I have had magical life with my little garden store. From the very first years when I only had a little spot on the road no wider that a two bedroom house and yard, it was so exciting.

You know, I have talked to young kids over the years about this business. They all see the work and miss the pleasure. What job can you have that allows you to create your own destiny, a job where you work like hell and have a chance to shut everything down and take your kids to Mexico and lie on the beach for couple of months.

The first dozen years were really the best. It was the life of farmer. You got ready, make the presentation to the gardeners, greet them year after year, enjoy their conversations about this mutual love of plants and their gardens You wish them well in the fall after the gardens were all put away. I had fun every day of my life.

I can count on one hand over twenty seven years when I did not want to go to work and face the day. I just could not wait to get back to that magical place where I could express myself. What job can you choose that will give you that!


"I would wake up in the middle of the night with an idea. I would drive down to the store and start creating. It would be so dark. Sometimes, I had to use the headlights of the car to saw and hammer and paint. Often, I would greet my employees as they arrived at that morning with my new work of art. Then I would drop from exhaustion the rest of the day.

Once I was on a high tall ladder, alone in the middle of night and it collapsed from under me and fell to the ground. I was just hanging, holding on to the roof rafters. I let go and hit the concrete floor, moaned a while, got back up and kept working, limping the rest of the night! I loved it so."


Sarah.

Did this life become more like work instead of fun? Why did that happen?

Nick.

Those years were bright and shiny until the day when it all got complicated, when I was forced to be a businessman rather than a keeper of plants. Plants became “inventory”, my gardening friends become “customers” It was when I knew less about my employees, their families and their hopes and dreams. The whole thing started to be about positions and telephones and sticky notes and meetings, the endless cycle of meetings!

Gosh, it suddenly became a job. Sure, some of that was necessary and important. But most of it was not. That’s the pattern, right? You grow and that comes with growth.

I guess. I am beginning to believe that most of these trappings of growth are not needed and in fact, diminish the personal enjoyment of everyone of a workplace.