Our vanishing "Greatest Generation" customers
The “Greatest Generation”
The gardener gone….
I knew he was back there,
behind the fence,
rustling behind the stacks of peat moss.
He would find the scraggy little shrubs and gently lift them out the pile, holding them up to the sunlight.
To us, they were plants for the dumpster.
For Mr. Miyagi, they were possible.
It was Mr. Miyagi and this family of gardeners and homeowners who put our kids through school and gave us the cash to build and grow and prosper. They were the “greatest generation”, returning from World War II and later the Korean Conflict.
There are less than one in ten of the World War II generation alive today, but we still see them, now and again, walking slowly through our doors to gather a few set onions and a couple of tomato plants.
Now, they are old. They are tired and their knees have given out.
That big summer garden suddenly turned from inviting to discouraging. A few plants, a little bag of soil, a watering can, and a pot are all they need now.
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