Earlier this week, as I watched a load of timber for some new bridges being built on our property be unloaded, I knew the season had arrived. That time of year which many in the Northeastern US and Eastern Canada are intimately familiar with, the time of year when the snow recedes, the sun is strong, and clay roads turn into greasy jungles of muck.

Growing up in Prince Edward Island, Canada, this time of year is hallmarked by taking a drive through the countryside and seeing numerous vehicles parked on the edges of main roads. Most folks who live in the houses at the end of long, unpaved lanes are not willing to drive their vehicles up the slippery ruts of mud that unpaved laneways inevitably become. The temptation is strong, but they know through experience that giving in only will make the driveway worse in the long run.

But the ground’s still frozen
Beneath all this mud;
And winter, even on its way out
Will take with it anything
That opens too soon.

An excerpt from “The Mud Season”, by James A Pearson

This season can have many names, False Spring or Late Winter, but how we choose to deal with it remains the same. You have to be able to remember that if you think that you might get stuck… you will. You have to remember that just because you got somewhere in the morning when the ground was still mostly frozen, it doesn’t mean that you’ll be able to get back that way later in the day. One has to exercise patience above all else. One learns the value of restraint and the power of simply choosing to do nothing at all. 

One learns the value of restraint and the power of simply choosing to do nothing at all... 

I admit fully that this can be a difficult concept to grasp. Superintendents are well aware of the raw excitement that comes with the brightness of a fresh spring day; the early glimpses of new blooms, the return of the songbirds, and the sound of snow melting into swollen streams. It can almost make us delirious with possibility, and the overwhelming energy of what lies ahead for the upcoming season. It brings us out of hibernation and eager to sharpen the reels, dust off the cup cutter and get busy. 

But like refraining from the attempt to navigate the muddy laneway too soon, often times the best offense is patience. It can feel like we are struggling to keep the lid on the season to come, but there are many times in a superintendent’s career the best course of action is to do nothing at all. Our senses and the very cells of our bodies are screaming at us to do something…anything really, but in the end, the best thing we can do is to leave  it be and wait until the time is truly right.

How many times in your life does this axiom hold true? How many conversations would have been better if you said nothing and put your intention on listening instead? How many times have you intervened in a situation to try and fix things…only to end up making it all a little worse? How many times has your need to do something replaced the wisdom of stepping back and allowing things to play out on their own? 

It’s a hard one for many, but especially for Superintendents. We are fixers of things. We are the people who folks come to when things need to get done. It’s an inherent part of our identity as course managers and greenkeepers. It can almost feel immoral for us not to intervene. But if we can learn to sit with this feeling, and like nature allow things to play out without our intervention, we may learn far more in the long run. 

It simply means we are choosing a more natural route, one that allows thing to unfold as they will on their own...

When we choose this path, it doesn’t mean we don’t care. It doesn’t mean that we are being apathetic and not doing our jobs. It simply means we are choosing a more natural route, one that allows thing to unfold as they will on their own. It means attuning to and respecting the rhythms in nature. When we watch nature in the spring time (or during any change in season) it has its own schedule. It has its own rhythm. It all gets done, but in its own time, and in its own pace. It is not forced, it is not pushed and it retains a measure of efficiency within all its myriad and intertwined actions.

So next time you are heading out in the beginning of the season to do something, maybe pause and ask yourself, “Is this really necessary? Or am I just doing this to quell the feelings of unease and uncertainty within myself?” It can be really hard to do nothing. It takes a lot of practice to be patient. It also takes a healthy dose of overdoing it and failing in the process. Learning from it all helps us see how a lighter touch is sometimes the best medicine. This is how we learn to grow our wisdom alongside growing grass.
In the long run, exercising the muscles of restraint will inevitably make you not only a better superintendent, but a wiser human as well. 

Thanks for reading.