A Mistake Is Not Always . . .

 

A Mistake Is Not Always . . .

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A mistake is not always a mistake.

I have a bit different attitude toward making mistakes than some of my good friends. I’ve learned. I’ve learned that mistakes lead to more learning. Mistakes lead to understanding that which I might have missed if I thought I always had to be right.

Any gardener knows mistakes are made. Ha! Garden mistakes are often not under our control. Correction. Garden mistakes are never under our control. We put ourselves and our planting into the hands of Mother Nature and nobody controls that Big Mama.

My garden, which used to be extensive, I’ve now limited to my herbs and a few flowers and lots of lavender. One of my favorite herbs has always been sage. I love sage with anything chicken, most particularly stuffing, not limited to holidays.

Sage, in Spanish lingo, is salvia. Several months ago I began hounding David at Vivero Centro for a couple new sage plants. Like most living things, sage seems to have a life limit, or perhaps I’ve not learned how to keep it going. Operator error looms large in my life.

One day I went home with three beautiful salvia plants, plunked them into their container, watered and cared for them diligently, watched them grow into beauties, filling the pot. It wasn’t until I went to harvest some of the leaves that I realized that this was not the salvia sage that I needed for chicken. This was a different salvia altogether!

Back to the Vivero. David said, “Yes, that is a purple-flowered salvia. What you want is the white-flowered variety.” So I ordered the white-flowered salvia.

Meanwhile, a little research yielded a lot of information. There are some 90 (or was it 900?) varieties of salvia. I learned my purple-flowered variety might have medicinal properties.

Intrigued, I wondered, what about tea? I made a cup. I made many cups of tea. What I discovered is that this salvia tea has a calming, soothing effect, for me. Medicinal? I don’t know. It’s become one of my favorite teas and I drink it often.

Meanwhile, my white-flowered salvia is flourishing. The hardest thing with salvia is keeping it trimmed back. Both varieties love to bloom. Show-offs.

Mama Nature seems to be thumbing her nose at us. In this country of a short rainy season, with never enough rain, and a long, long dry, with too much dry, I never thought I’d look forward to the end of rain.

By September, first week, we usually are treasuring every drip and drop of rain. Here we are this year, past mid-month, still waking up to soppy squishy mornings. Every morning.

That’s a good thing, right? My basil and marjoram are in rainy heaven. They demand a generous drink of water every day. My mint and oregano are suffering. Drowning might be the more correct description. Thyme and rosemary look tolerant but seem to be losing patience.

My mint might recover but I will need to replace my oregano, after the rains retreat to wherever they go when the Big Dry takes over. If we get a Dry this year.

As I said earlier, I make mistakes. I would never dare accuse Madame Mother Nature of making a mistake. Perhaps she’s made some “trial runs” but never a mistake.

Good thing that I don’t mind making mistakes. Without ordering the wrong salvia, I would never have discovered my comfort tea. Mistakes are okay. It is not everyone who can grow grapefruit on a lavender tree.  

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

September 18, 2025

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