What NOT to Get Gardeners This Christmas: Part 1 of 4

I have reached the age when I look forward to gifts with more dread than anticipation. Perhaps it's just that I'm getting old and crotchety. Certainly it is a sign that I have developed particular (and perhaps peculiar) tastes that few people seem to truly understand. Since I have one of those faces that simply doesn't lie, I find that opening a gift and trying to look ecstatically pleased is an ordeal. I appreciate the thought - but very rarely the actual gift. But I do not want to hurt the giver, who I know tried their very best.

Since my husband has the same problem (except that he finds it easier to fake joyfulness) I am hazarding a guess and that is that many of us have the same difficulty. And so, as I launch into one more essay on what gardeners want for Christmas, let me begin with a list of what we tend NOT to want.

Don't try to make aesthetic choices for someone else. So much goes into the sum of our individual preferences that it is difficult to get those right. Take something as simple as a planter for the garden. These days you can find some that are difficult to tell apart, except that one is terra cotta, one is a polymer imitation, and another is plastic. Since they look close to identical on the outside, you may think that it doesn't really matter which one you get. But there are gardeners who are purists - and they rarely accept imitation anything. There are those who value economy above all who would be aghast if you paid good money for the polymer when you could have gotten something almost as good in plastic. And there are those who love terra cotta for its earth look but whose joints, creaking with age, tell them that they are grateful for the polymer imitation.

So while visually, all three may seem the same, the underlying values that make us respond to each are very different.

By the way - give yourself a gift and DO try the new lightweight polymer "pottery" - you'll love it. It weighs almost nothing and so is easy to move around, it looks great, and it is insulated to protect the plants' roots from temperature extremes. My favorite brand is American Designer Pottery which uses a medium called Thermo-lite, which weighs 90% less than terra cotta. Unless you are radically purist, these will fool you and your plants will probably prefer it.

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