I’m sure I was born technophobic, and I sometimes feel a bit of a weed not being up with the technology of the twenty first century. But then what is a weed?
Let’s see what Ralph Waldo Emerson had to say in a lecture given at the time when ‘cotton’ made up a great part of America’s wealth. It was, as the title of this lecture suggested, ‘the fortune of the Republic’. “And what is cotton? One plant in some two hundred thousand plants known to the botanist – vastly the largest part of which are reckoned ‘weeds’. And what is a weed? A plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered, and one of the two hundred thousand, probably yet to be of utility… Time will bring an inventor to every plant. There is not a property in nature, but a mind is born to seek and find it.”
Over the past four years I think that I have spent more time gardening than at any time in the previous seventy years of my adult life! Many of you know of our move from our gardenless maison secondaire adjacent to the Catholic Church to our present permanent abode adjacent to the Protestant Temple.
We now have a very large garden and when we took it over it was, to say the least, very neglected. Rough grass and dandelions!
Pity the poor dandelion. It is, in many ways, nature’s perfect plant. With a taproot that grows more than a foot long (and don’t we know that for a fact), it can survive in climates of scorching heat and bitter cold. Its tender, young leaves make a tasty addition to any salad, or they can be boiled as a tea infusion. The dandelion’s leaves apparently contain more beta-carotene than carrots and more iron than spinach. Its blossoms, when properly fermented, make a sweet white wine. That taproot that I mentioned contains medicinal properties, and can be beneficial to both the liver and the kidneys as both a diuretic and blood cleanser. It can also be dried, roasted and ground as a coffee substitute. The plant’s white, milky sap can be used to alleviate bee stings and, allegedly, to remove calluses and moles. And then there is the dandelion’s ingenious method of reproduction. That beautiful yellow bloom is actually a composite of hundreds of tiny blossoms that mature into the familiar white globe of seeds. Unlike most other seeds, dandelion seeds can germinate without a period of dormancy, and the plant is self-pollinating. Each plant contains hundreds of parachute-like seeds that, to the delight of toddlers everywhere, who pluck and blow them apart, can be carried effortlessly on the wind for miles and miles. Wow – the dandelion is certainly up there as a contender for nature’s perfect plant.
Yet, plonk a dandelion down in the middle of a manicured lawn and it is treated like a terrorist. Armies of lawn care professionals are dispatched with chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction to eradicate this menace. It is, after all, a weed. We spend millions of pounds a year on herbicides, pesticides and other lawn-care chemicals in our attempts to rid our lawns and gardens of these and other so called weeds. Though I am proud to report that last year our village declared itself a herbicide and pesticide free village. The council no longer uses such chemicals to control weeds and encourages residents to do likewise.
But what is a weed? Well we’ve heard Ralph Waldo Emerson’s definition – ‘a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered’ – though perhaps Mr Emerson, who, apparently, as an ardent gardener should have known better, isn’t quite right with this one. The dandelion has, after all, as we have heard, many virtues, most of which were well know during his lifetime; and yet we still call it a weed.
My dictionary defines a weed as “any plant that grows wild and profusely, especially one that grows among cultivated plants, depriving them of space, light and food.”
Hang on, isn’t that the sort of argument I’ve heard from people of certain political persuasions about certain other people? People who are different in certain ways – people who come from other lands. Immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers – ‘They don’t belong here’; ‘they’re taking our jobs’; ‘weed them out’.
A.A. Milne’s character ‘Eeyore’ once said that ‘weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them’. And so, I believe, it is with people. We meet or see a stranger and we don’t know what their virtues may be. So we must not dismiss them as weeds just because of their appearance; the colour of their skin, or their dress; or of any other perceived differences to us. We must remember Eeyore’s words that “weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them”. And Mr Emerson’s words, that a weed is “a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered”. We need to get to know people before we pass judgement on their usefulness in our society’s garden and remember that even what we call weeds can be cultivated and brought to fruitfulness.
But of course it too easy to just dismiss people who may be different to us, as weeds, as taking our space, taking the goodness out of our society and not putting anything back. Too easy to dismiss the perceived weeds of society as something to be got rid of.
In describing the process by which we cultivate our gardens, Michael Pollan, American writer and ethical food production activist, tells us that “weeding is the process by which we make informed choices in nature, discriminate between the good and bad, apply our intelligence and sweat to the earth.” We owe at least this same level of care, discrimination and intelligence to all human beings.
I do accept that there are some bad weeds in our gardens and that dandelions do need keeping in check. I do accept that there are some undesirable characters in our society – characters who are bent on doing the rest of society no good and that they have to be dealt with – humanely.
Plants, including those who some would classify as weeds, are what feed us, shelter us and beautify our surroundings. They populate our land.
People, and that is all of us, who share that land with the plants (and of course with animals, fish and birds) have to use those plants to survive. Of course farmers have to control plants that might otherwise compromise the yield of the plants that feed us. And plants feed us well – though I understand that many fruits and vegetables would never reach our tables if it were not for immigrant workers who are prepared to work in difficult conditions for low pay to bring in the harvest.
Making the informed choices in nature that Michael Pollan asks us to make isn’t always easy – neither is it easy making informed choices and decisions in society. But we must persevere and we must not allow those in power to take us down any paths that might lead to indiscriminate weeding.
Amen
Ray Seal
Ipswich Unitarian Meeting House 