Heading to the garden to seek refuge from the White House's nonsense

"The glory of gardening: hands in the dirt, head in the sun, heart with nature. To nurture a garden is to feed not just on the body, but the soul." 

 — Alfred Austin—

AUBURN — As I watch an administration implode in Washington, D.C., as well as spread its drivel via Twitter, I retreat to my backyard, where well-tended gardens serve as my sanctuary from an embattled White House that revels in the spectacle of self-inflicted mayhem — which also brings joy to nations trying to undermine America.

I am hoping my garden and our constitution will withstand the forces of nature and a presidency clearly in disarray.

This administration conjures up never-ending diatribes from a leadership that feeds on its own hostility. This virus of indifference that comes from top has infected the country. Our leaders are acting like bar-room brawlers and our citizens’ intolerance to newcomers sometimes ends in violence.

I believe my vegetable garden and that living document we hold so dear to us will weather anything nature or misguided politicians can throw at us this summer.

According to numerous articles, a backyard loaded with trees, flowers and vegetables can reduce stress immediately. A long hike in the woods also has the same effect on the human body.

Tell me something I don't know!

The bonus here is you can tune out American politics that features hollering, boasting and narcissism. Read any controversial story online and observe vicious trolls rise up like an angry mob and spew their hatred in a long scroll of abhorrence.

Talk about garden therapy is not nonsense or FAKE news. Flowers and fresh vegetables are like aspirins to relieve pain. Nature’s splendid colors whittle away the day’s stress.

Trust me on this one.

According to the American Horticultural Therapy Association (AHTA.com): 

“Horticultural therapy is a time-proven practice. The therapeutic benefits of garden environments have been documented since ancient times. In the 19th century, Dr. Benjamin Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and recognized as the "Father of American Psychiatry," was first to document the positive effect working in the garden had on individuals with mental illness.

“Horticultural therapy techniques are employed to assist participants to learn new skills or regain those that are lost. Horticultural therapy helps improve memory, cognitive abilities, task initiation, language skills, and socialization. In physical rehabilitation, horticultural therapy can help strengthen muscles and improve coordination, balance, and endurance. In vocational horticultural therapy settings, people learn to work independently, problem solve, and follow directions.”

Planting vegetable and flower gardens keeps me balanced, inspires me and provides an excellent workout in the warm June sun.

I view my gardens and yard like naturalist John Muir, who believed forests and other wild places on earth nurture the soul. 

“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul,” Muir said. “Keep close to Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.”

Perhaps, the current administration should listen to Muir’s prudent words.

Muir, a spiritual man, believed the forest was his cathedral   — a place to contemplate and pray.

My yard and the Maine’s numerous hiking trails give me natural a lift without taking pills to confront life. Gardening is also my antidote to my stress. When I tend to my yard, I put the radio on and listen to the Red Sox or Mozart in the summer sun. In the woods, I have my camera with me as I huff and puff up a gravel trail where nature’s senses sooth me.

Whether I am toiling in the yard or briskly climbing up Mt. Apatite in Auburn, I enjoy the exertion, the chance to sink my hands into the rich, black earth of my garden and mingle with nature on its own breathtaking terms.

I will continue to seek out nature’s salubrious benefits in my yard as the insanity, spitefulness and shabbines in the nation’s capitol peeks.

Mouths will runneth over in politics

"Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress; but I repeat myself."

 — Mark Twain

We’ve dumbed down television, made reading a good book a Herculean task, and the Internet has become a hodgepodge of the inane and a home for narcissi.

So why not continue to make a farce out of the next presidential election where a lengthy roll call of pathetic candidates offer empty promises to voters who have little interest in their own future.

Like all kids who are taught that the United States presidency is where men of honor and intellect run for office for the greater good, I believed that the best and brightest, with the highest regard for their fellow man, belonged in the Oval Office.

But any voter, who has common sense has seen the current crop of self-righteous, presidential wannabes, is probably thinking about voting for their cat or staying at home on election day to watch a reruns of “Seinfeld.”

The Grand Old Party is loaded with paranoid characters who rant and rave about illegal immigrants, the elderly (because they have lived too long), global warming lies and their greatest nemesis — the government — also known as the Evil Empire to many republicans.

Many of them resemble the “Seinfeld” character “Crazy Joe Devola.”

Answer me this!

Why do candidates run for election even though they hate our government? They see evil everywhere in Washington D.C. They tell us our greatest fear is the establishment and believe it is ruining our lives. And yet, they have no problem making money working within the government.

Funny how that works.

So why do they want be government employee? Of course, the obvious answer is to collect a big paycheck, endless benefits, and satisfy their ego.

They are masters of doublespeak — deliberately euphemistic, ambiguous, or obscure language. That’s the textbook definition of political language that is used as ammunition by career politicians who can’t possible provide a voter with reasonable answers to today’s complicated problems.

Right now, and I am not naming names, but there is a GOP contender who wants to bomb oil wells to put an end to endless terrorism emanating from the Middle East.

Does this uniformed presidential candidate understand the environmental consequences of blowing up oil wells, which would make Americans wince when petroleum prices rise like Mount Everest?

And while he spews blanket statements about our dismal future and evil, illegal immigrants, hoping to frighten Americans into voting for him, there are others like him who tout their “my country, right or wrong” attitude.

I cringe when I hear someone say, “I am voting for him because he speaks his mind.”

What the hell does that mean, anyway?

To me, it is another candidate spewing outlandish remarks to alienate a constituency already divided by party lines. Making rude comments pulls a nation apart. There are millions of supporters clapping their hands for a candidate who shouldn’t be running for the school board, never mind the White House.

I will never understand why half the middle class votes against its best interests when they cast their ballots for the GOP.

The guy, who wants to carpet bomb oil wells, jail illegal immigrants and switch Denali (the high one) back to Mount McKinley if he is elected president, just got a ringing endorsement from a former vice presidential contender from Alaska.

That should tell you something about the lowest common denominator in American politics. He should have asked Moe, Larry, Shemp or Curley to join his political campaign.

By the way, the top GOP contender, who speaks his warped mind, just went with the flow when he promised to support the Republican party.

So much for being a maverick in politics. In the end, they all go with the flow and a nation suffers thanks to a lack of leadership and vision.

Remember that when you vote!