"Poetizing the Daily"
Head-body-heart, trio guardian of the memories of this first year as gardener of the Campus de la Transition: images of imagined words from the 3D pencil to the 3D of the vegetable garden, dreams without limit that a limit of character cannot accurately restore. To try to be exhaustive over the last fifteen months in the green, I first drew up a list at the Prévert, even if that is not what I prefer. And if I put a little bit of binder in it, a little bit of argilo-humic complex, it would make something like...
Autumn 2021. After an amazing nomadic trip by bike, I sow the seed of my tree in a land of Marne, the arrose of a little Seine and start dreaming by watching it germinate, unfold its stem and branch under my care. This stem is the vegetable garden-mandala of the Campus, the heart of my activities; its branches, the thousand ideas that were born of it. By drawing this vegetable garden inspired by permaculture (synonym of common sense peasant), I improvised as a "paysangist" architect. From there, a multitude of creations is born: a friendly English garden joins the vegetable garden with its living room in cultivated straw boots - Yeah, cherry tomatoes grow on the dining table! On the court, passivelores and clematites seat the castle, watered with sun and water in the gardeners with autonomous reservoir. My acolyte Matthieu Vergnol, in Civic Service at my side, invested body and soul of his sweet and crazy mind and, together, we learn the profession of gardener. We are proud to have harvested more than 1.7 tons of vegetables in six months over 530m2, an average of 3kg/m2 - including 900 kg of squash and zucchini, and a portion for Emmaus!
If the goal of food autonomy is not one, the garden is an excellent educational support for understanding agroecological issues. Hundreds of students follow my teachings that I wish to contrast with their daily lives: contrast creates emotion, and emotion marks memory. My educational model is growing: history, challenges and agricultural alternatives with the students of the PKI, soil analysis workshop with the ESSEC, introduction to permaculture with the ICAM and the officials of the INET, reshuffle the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles with the T-Campers followed by the co-construction of modern dry toilets at the castle, visits and participatory projects... the garden is a real hive, and honey is apparently good there! I remember the touching testimony of a young student of the Bachelor ACT: "Tim, gardener of my dreams for life. Simply conveying the taste of gardening fills me with a deep sense of ecological and social utility.
However, sometimes the fruits of the garden are bitter. Since my first plantings and still today, I regularly confront my inner demon, that of the demanding perfectionist, eternal dissatisfied, tracking the chimera of the "perfect combo" (culture plan, I hate you my love...!) This is the reverse of the experience: the more I understand the bio-physico-chemical interactions of an ecosystem, the more complex the infinity of parameters makes its design. Sometimes I end up pissed off, exhausted or even sick... So to calm down, I am inspired, I read The vegetable garden of a dreamer (ed. Terre Vivante, 2022) by gardener Xavier Mathias, a fustigator of the "dream catchers", these dogmas, objectives and magical recipes that threaten the natural peace of the gardens. My creed: "Does it, it's better than perfect."
But already for the year 2023 the projects are scrambling in the hall of my imagination, responding for many to the urgency of the essential, such as the installation of rain water waste pickers or the recycling of urine in the vegetable garden - already 500 L recovered thanks to campuses and campuses following an on-site experiment - and a possible research-action project on this planetary issue that enlivens me more than ever. After Matthieu, Bertille's recent arrival in the garden and the creative dynamics of a new generation of campuses put me in confidence to assume my growing responsibilities and realize dreams: to increase the productivity of the vegetable garden, to be autonomous in eggs, to plant a large orchard-mandala or to host a live show on the open stage of the vegetable garden! Against the background of these thousand and one ambitions and not to lose reason, I try to never forget why I go to the garden every morning: to poetize everyday life.