Welcome to Cultivar...
Where we're cultivating variety - in life and in the garden
🌿 Welcome to Cultivar 🌿
The word ‘cultivar’ in horticulture is a combination of the words ‘cultivate’ and ‘variety’, and that’s what I’m trying to do in this current phase of life: to cultivate variety.
But what does that really mean - and will it be exhausting? Isn’t it enough to be showing up for work, for family and friends, exercising just enough to be able to eat plenty of cake and regularly attempting some form of self-care?
Cultivation is about preparing land and growing crops, yes, but it’s also about developing and improving things, making them stronger.
Variety can be defined as the characteristic of often changing and being different.
This speaks to me at a time in life when I’m trying to figure out two quite important questions: Who am I now? and What do I want from the second half of my life?
I’m trying not to use the words ‘midlife crisis’ but there’s a definite shift going on… a transition from one state of being to another, and I don’t think I’ll be the same person, or doing the same things, or aiming for the same goals as I used to.
The process has begun - perhaps I was unceremoniously thrust into it - by perimenopause, job loss, career shifts, bereavement, parenting teens, all the weighty stuff of midlife.
So this newsletter is about looking for ways to find change, improvement, hope, light, in the messy middle bit of life which can feel heavy and monotonous and relentless. It’s about coming out the other side connected with yourself and the world around you, and maybe even some kind of higher power.
I have writing to focus my creativity; gardening which calms my mind, and I get lost in nature when I’m feeling overwhelmed.
I think that’s how I’m cultivating variety in my life.
They’re simple things but they offer escape, growth and connection.
I want to write about them here, to share gardening advice, thoughts about midlife and discover the wonders of nature - and to explore what I’m really thinking and feeling by putting some words on a page.
One of my favourite quotes is this, from Joan Didion:
“I don't know what I think until I write it down.”
So I’m going to write some things down, and figure out what I think, and cultivate some variety in my mind and my life.
Feel free to join me, and let’s see what happens…