Our Origin Story, Just Chance or Destiny?
When Cody and I were 10 years old we each had an experience that, in hindsight, laid the cornerstone for our future careers. For Cody it was becoming a landowner.
His grandmother owned several parcels of land in East Texas. To be fair about who inherited what, she wrote the plat number of each parcel on a bit of paper and had her heirs draw a number from a hat. Before Cody could fathom that he now owned half an acre of land, his mom told him he was responsible for paying the property taxes. At that time, they were about $60 a year. Cody earned the money by mowing lawns. Bought a money order, licked the stamp, and personally mailed his tax payment to the county assessors office. He was responsible for every step of the process. That was his first inkling that he enjoyed “taking care of business.”
At 10, the question of what I wanted to be when I grew up hadn’t crossed my mind, but the answer arrived tucked in a box of Cheerios. Remember surprises in cereal boxes? Mine was a package of zinnia seeds. I immediately planted them in our front flower bed. Not long afterward my parents packed me and my sisters into our Oldsmobile station wagon – the model with the cool wood side panels – for a two-week vacation in Colorado. When we got back home, the front flower bed was a glorious rainbow of multicolored zinnias. I was filled with wonder that I could grow things so beautiful. I didn’t know the term landscape designer, didn’t know you could go to college to study horticulture, any of that stuff. I just knew I wanted to grow things and create that kind of beauty.
That’s our origin story. We grew up. I went to school to learn about plants and love, love, love designing gardens. Cody started out mowing lawns as a boy and went on to build a thriving landscape maintenance business. Because he’s excellent at running the business, I get to focus on what I love. Right from the start, there’s been a natural division of interests and talents. He’s the yin to my yang. How lucky can two kids be?