By LYNN HANRAHAN
Los Alamos

Where discoveries are made — isn’t that our motto? I couldn’t get Mr. Chandler’s letter from yesterday (link) out of my mind, so I had to look for the old county violation letters in the document bag in the garage. When they arrived a few years ago I was enraged that someone came poking around, photographing a kids’ garden.  

Now I see them differently. They make me so happy I could cry. It’s almost like we had paid serious money to document a day in the life of one of our homeschooling journeys. Botany — the photographs capture misadventures in weeping willow vascularity and a multi-year fascination with the wonder of vines. The pictures would never be suitable as ads for the local garden tour. They do lack curb appeal but so what?

Back then it was mostly my son’s garden. When we spoke last week, he was looking into the doctoral program at UC-Davis for horticultural stuff. Had he only been allowed to plant petunias at regularly spaced intervals in a picture perfect, county approved garden would his love of plants survived? I doubt it. His love was fostered by the freedom to make a big, glorious mess and all the wonderful people he learned from in the local Master Gardeners group — especially Carlos.

We made a lot of big educational messes over the years. I hope to make another big one over the next few days. The girls are leaving the country for their first solo adventure Monday, so I keep bugging my husband to take all the tires off the cars and to find the oil pan, so they have a hands-on opportunity to learn skills necessary for safe travel. Knowing how to do all that stuff matters. What if we were not allowed because of some county rule?

In the meantime, I might just look for the other envelopes full of pictures of violations our county was kind enough to send and paste them in our scrapbook. Who would’ve thought.