A few weeks ago, we spoke about rhubarb—edible versus ornamental—and how kindness helps heal. I shared how dear friends offered to care for Jolee while I served as a Big Buddy to a child at the annual Comfort Zone Camp for children grieving the loss of a loved one to suicide.
My Little Buddy and I are at Comfort Zone Camp, where healing begins through kindness, listening, and shared moments in nature.
After returning from the weekend, I felt exhausted yet deeply grateful. And Jolee was well cared for, greeting me home with joyful enthusiasm.
Susan and Don, the loving friends who watched her, told me she refused to take a road walk while I was away. Each time they tried to walk her, she would “put on the brakes.”
Jolee would put on the brakes in fear. when she first arrived. (see a previous post, Merry Season of Love over Fear)
Gathering Courage
It brought me back to Jolee’s earliest days after adoption.
You may recall her story. Jolee came from Mississippi, rescued from a kill shelter. When she first arrived, fear filled her spirit. On walks, she would stop every few feet, uncertain and afraid. I’d carry her a short distance before setting her down. Slowly, over many weeks, she’d walk farther on her own, gathering courage with each step.
Healing often happens that way.
A Patch of Mayapple
At camp, while walking with our Healing Circle group, my Little Buddy came upon a patch of Mayapple growing beside the trail. This is my third year being her Big Buddy, and I learned she has taken up gardening, so I asked if she knew the plant. She didn’t.
A woodland colony of native Mayapple unfurls like green umbrellas across the forest floor.
Mayapple (Podophyllum peltatum) is one of my favorite native woodland plants. This time of year, they line shady paths like green umbrellas unfurling across the forest floor. Hidden beneath those umbrella-like leaves are delicate, waxy, white flowers you only notice if you slow down enough to look underneath. That’s part of their charm.
The shy, waxy-white flower of Mayapple hides beneath umbrella-like leaves in spring woodlands.
A poem by Minnie Curtis Wait (1901) describes them as “a host of green umbrellas” that might shelter fairy people from sudden showers. I love that image. Even the name Mayapple is endearing, reminding me of the old-time expression “the apple of my eye,” something precious and dearly adored.
When I explained the meaning to my Little Buddy, she smiled and announced that she now had a boyfriend. Young love…
The Balloon We Carry
The Mayapple also carries a lesson. Though charming, much of the plant is toxic. Yet hidden beneath the leaves are beauty, usefulness, and eventually fruit. It reminded me how often healing and hardship grow side by side in the garden of life.
By late summer, Mayapple produces a small apple-like fruit hidden beneath its leaves.
The volunteer therapist and leader of our Healing Circle, Dan Graham (far right in photo below), shared an analogy I will not forget. He spoke of the emotions we carry through life—the grief, trauma, anger, and heartbreak we sometimes bury while convincing ourselves we are “fine.” He compared those unspoken feelings to air building inside a balloon. Eventually, if ignored, the pressure becomes too much, and it bursts.
But healing can begin by slowly letting the air out. Gradually. Carefully. One conversation, one memory, one truthful moment at a time.
As he spoke, tears softly welled in my eyes as I recognized how easily we can carry such balloons without fully realizing it. I suspect many of us do.
What the Children Taught Us
The memorial service, which concludes each Comfort Zone Camp, is a celebration of love and remembrance rather than sorrow. Our group was called the Grasshoppers. One by one, each child stood before the crowd and shared what they had learned about suicide during the weekend.
Campers and volunteers share fun and connection during an icebreaker activity at Comfort Zone Camp.
“It’s complicated,” one child said.
Another explained that mental illness is often involved.
Moments of laughter, teamwork, and courage during a challenge course activity at Comfort Zone Camp.
And perhaps most heartbreakingly wise of all: “A person doesn’t want to die. They just can’t handle the pain anymore.”
Then, two campers simultaneously blurted out, “Suicide sucks,” drawing laughter, tears, and heartfelt applause from nearly everyone in the audience.
Indeed, it does. As does silence, fear, and carrying pain alone.
Perhaps that is why healing—like the shy flower hidden beneath the Mayapple leaf—so often begins when someone feels safe enough to finally be seen.
The Garden of Life
As I think about Comfort Zone Camp and the many ways people help one another every day, I often wonder why helping others feels so deeply fulfilling. Perhaps it’s because somewhere within us, we recognize what a miracle life truly is—whether you call it God, Spirit, nature, or simply the wonder of existence itself.
The compassionate volunteers and Healing Circle leaders help create a safe place for children grieving the loss of a loved one.
There is something profoundly humbling about living with open-heartedness rather than merely moving through routines and responsibilities. So many people spend their days tending obligations that may not nourish their souls. Yet fulfillment often arrives through the smallest moments: gardening, walking through the woods, helping someone feel less alone, witnessing a flower unfurl, or pausing long enough to hear birds sing.
Just outside my side garage door, a robin is tending a nest with three eggs waiting to hatch. Only a few feet away, tucked into another shrub across the walkway, a mourning dove patiently sits on her own nest. I cherish these reminders of life continuing forward and the remarkable beauty of it all.
Cherish the Beauty
Perhaps that is what gardens and nature remind us of best: we are here to cherish the beauty and miracles around us and to participate in them by lending a helping hand.
I came home from camp very tired, yet full in heart. And I hope when life feels especially heavy or exhausting, you take time to care for yourself, too. Sit quietly. Watch the magnificence of nature. Notice the rhythms carried from season to season. Because the cycle of life never truly ends —it continues and renews as it begins again in the garden of life.
Garden Dilemmas? Visit AskMaryStone.com or tune in on your favorite podcast app.
Garden Dilemmas? AskMaryStone@gmail.com or tune in on your favorite Podcast App.
Prefer to Listen?
This story is also shared in this week’s episode of Garden Dilemmas, Delights & Discoveries, with additional reflections from the screen porch:
