Some Lynn Valley seniors are learning that you can’t escape chores in the retirement home – at least not the fun ones.
The suggestion of planting, weeding and watering at the Lynn Valley Care Centre brings a twinkle to 92-year-old Jim Sim’s eyes. The garden he left behind was his personal oasis.
The Sim homestead on Mountain Highway was framed by three yards, each of which had a beautiful garden. His favourite corner had a fountain that flowed into a pool shaded by a Japanese maple tree.
Sim could spend all day in the garden.
“Pretty well,” he says.
Besides the therapeutic benefits, gardening offers a sense of freedom – apparently.
“You could take your clothes off and nobody would know,” says Sim, with a genial laugh.
There can also be stressful moments in the garden, like the time Sim set fire to a hedge.
“That was interesting,” he recalls. “I had a bunch of crap that was under the hedge and I couldn’t get it out with a rake.”
So he set fire to the bush. Meanwhile, Sim’s brother was the local fire chief at the time and Jim himself was a volunteer firefighter.
The longtime Lynn Valley resident came down with pneumonia last fall and suffered complications which forced Sim from independent living. While change can often cause anxiety, Sim found a rooftop sanctuary when he arrived at the Lynn Valley Care Centre.
Five years ago staff at the seniors’ home planted the seeds for a small herb and vegetable garden – the project was a collaboration between a nutritionist and a cook with a penchant for fresh produce. Since then, some usual green suspects have cropped up: dill, parsley, mint, basil, garlic, lettuce, tomatoes and tarragon.
“The herbs have done very well,” says Jean Babic, recreational programmer at the care centre. “The tomatoes love the sun. So we haven’t really come across something that has not worked.”
The dill will liven up a salmon dish, while the basil is an added flavour boost for spaghetti sauce in the dining hall.
But before the food arrives on their plates, some of the seniors will have had a hand in the meal preparation.
As part of a garden club, the seniors will plant and pick the green bounty, collect it in a basket and bring it down to the kitchen.
“So it’s kind of replicating what home life would be like when they had their own garden,” explains Babic.
Care home resident Grace Matheson recently ambled through the rooftop garden and smiled at her surroundings. Before she came here Matheson helped co-found the Navvy Jack Community Garden in West Vancouver.
“It’s good for your soul,” she says of being in the garden. “As soon as I hit the top step I shed all my earthly problems.”
Mobility challenges make it difficult for Matheson to get down to Dundarave these days to visit the garden. For her 90th birthday recently, the retired high school teacher requested a trip to VanDusen Botanical Garden.
Matheson’s family gifted her with that garden party; a scrapbook of memories from that special day sits on her night table.
If Matheson is craving an al fresco escape she can head to the fifth floor of the care home.
The elevator door opens and Sim wheels his way into the Healing Garden. There’s a wraparound patio with panoramic views of the North Shore mountains. Wooden benches dot the rooftop retreat for residents and their loved ones to relax.
What began as three plots has since grown to 35 planting containers spread around the approximately 1,000-square-foot patio.
Sim spots the tomato plants and the yellow flowers trigger a memory of his late wife. The flowers have to be fertilized before the fruit can form. Sophie thought they were a weed and picked them.
“She learned,” he says softly.
Sim surveys the garden and from his rooftop perch looks over Lynn Valley where he cultivated a life.
He was a meat cutter and had his own shop, Sim’s Meat Market, at the corner of Lynn Valley Road and Mountain Highway.
Sim is looking forward to spending more time in the garden at his new home and getting his hands dirty.
“It certainly gives an opportunity for people here to do something they couldn’t do otherwise,” he says.
“They get up and they just have to pull a few weeds and they’ve accomplished something.”
