When Linda's mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, she decided to use their mutual love of gardening to help fund the fight for a cure.
Linda's Story
"My mother was an avid gardener."
I was raised in Arizona, where it's tough to have a nice garden, but my mom had done a beautiful job. I still remember playing with the hollyhocks while she was planting. When I grew older and had kids of my own, I realized that I loved gardening, as well, and especially loved having worked with her.
As I went back into nurseries with the plan of building my own garden, I found the beautiful plants that she had been planting, the columbine and all of the gorgeous little plants. I decided that I was going to go back and build my mother's garden in my own home.
"I really sink into this quiet space, this moment where I'm here and completely present to the garden and to myself."
I started building the garden about seven years ago, and it became a very introspective time for me. I loved it. It was a busy time of my life. I had a ton of teenagers, and they all brought everyone home. It was good for me to have this quiet experience. I worked with someone to create the side and backyards, but when we got to the front yard, I knew enough to do it myself.
"My parents had been married for 62 years when she was diagnosed with breast cancer."
My father had Alzheimer's. My mother was his caretaker and she was single-minded in that. When she was diagnosed, it was just the most incredible moment to go and visit her and watch her struggle with this whole thing. They were going to take her in for an experimental radiation therapy, rather than go in and biopsy and try to take out anything, because she was 86 at the time. It was all going to make her very sick and she knew that.
My sisters and I were constantly telling her she didn't have to do this. The tumor was very small and encapsulated, and the doctors didn't think it was going to be a problem. She responded, "Are you kidding? Even if it doesn't do anything for me, I will do this for you, I will do this for your daughters and their daughters." It was just such a moment. First she gives me life, and then she gives her whole self.
"I wanted to do something to help her, something concrete. Then, I had an epiphany."
My mother loved coming here and seeing the garden. She loved the whole process, watching it take place and evolve. When a friend suggested I hold a garden tour, it hit me. I decided to hold a garden tour that would benefit breast cancer research.
I had never done my own garden tour, but I'd been in a garden tour before, so I thought, I can do this. I called the tour "Personal Sanctuaries." The garden had always been my mother's sanctuary, and I also found my sanctuary by her side, dressing those hollyhock dolls as she planted.
"It was a beautiful, knock-your-socks-off garden tour."
Of the 200 people who came through that first year, the majority were women. They would give me detailed personal histories of what they were going through and how much it meant to them to know that women were doing things like this to fight breast cancer. We raised $8000 that year. It was beautiful, and I came away committed to making this tour an annual, evolving experience.
"Gardening itself has been a wonderful thing for me."
It's a complete challenge. It's an adventure, and I love adventures. It's an emotional outlet as well as a person builder. I love and need that. There are times when I walk through in the morning and the water droplets are still on the leaves and petals and there's this crispness in the air. Sometimes, when I'm working in the garden, I can see my mother's face. It's all so rewarding, and I'd be remiss if I didn't thank God for all of it, for what I see every day and what I think is His handiwork and the way in which He has expanded my knowledge and my love for creation and civilization and human beings, in all our fleshiness.
