Features: The Gardening Coach • Susan Harris

Photo: Julie Wiatt

Turning your passions into a career — isn’t that the American dream? And working for yourself is surely taking it to the next level. Silver Spring’s Kathy Jentz, editor and publisher of the year-old Washington Gardener magazine, has done just that. Maybe the seeds of Kathy’s career in the gardening world were planted when, as a child, she helped her parents with their “community hippie garden plot” in Gaithersburg. She remembers lugging water in milk jugs — lug enough jugs and you never forget. Or maybe it started with visits to her gardener grandparents — especially the ones in Bavaria — whose garden plot outside of town was like a second home to them.

As a teen she became interested in writing, and sharpened her skills by studying journalism in college and holding three internships as a writer. Her work-life began by writing for association publications, but after 10+ years she found herself working on five publications and two websites, none of which excited her. At that point Kathy heard a wake-up call to change her life. She made a commitment to pursue her passions, and in her case that meant quitting the hated day job to start a much-needed local gardening magazine. That was in January of 2005, and the Washington Gardener magazine was launched a mere three months later.

Despite warnings from her more cautious parents, Kathy jumped without a safety net (a secure day job) into the high-risk world of magazine publishing. This was a world where new ventures typically break even, if ever, only after three to five years of hard work in today’s Internet era. But what motivates her is a clear vision: responding to the needs and interests of local gardeners using only local writers and local subjects, and responding to her readers’ questions. Thus, the magazine has become a magnet for both writers and photographers in the area.

In addition to actually producing the magazine, Kathy’s life as editor/publisher includes appearing on local radio and television; at Earth Days; Arbor Days; garden tours and gardening events of any-and-all types; signing up new subscribers and promoting the mag. And then there’s the task of soliciting potential advertisers — not the most fun part of the job but key to the magazine’s success. And which come first, the subscribers or the advertisers? Not an easy thing to juggle.

Now, say you meet Kathy at a social function and you’re searching for conversation starters but don’t know a thing about gardening or publishing. No problem. Try movies — since most weeknights she attends movie preview screenings. Attending screenplay-writing classes is on her to-do list. Or you could chat about theater and opera, her favorite weekend entertainments. Then there’s the rock star, Prince. Kathy’s not just a fan, but the organizer of his local fan organization. Somehow she has time for craft events and church too. And she does all this without a car. Yes, it’s part of her philosophy to live without the great American polluting machine. And she’s even on the board of Action Committee for Transit, which works locally to make it easier for people to go car-free. And somehow she manages to find time to keep up with politics. So there are plenty of potential conversation starters with this 21st Century Renaissance woman.

I first met Kathy in 2002, when she joined the Takoma Horticulture Club and brought so much positive energy to the club that we quickly asked her to be our vice-president. Then, along with thousands of passersby, I’ve watched her transform her garden at the corner of Philadelphia and Fenton, previously the site of a PEPCO substation, into a lush oasis of color.

Like a growing number of gardeners across the D.C. area, I’m an avid reader of her fine magazine, and in the spirit of Acting Locally (and learning locally, which is what gardening is all about), I encourage gardeners at all levels to subscribe.

Contribute to takomagarden.net
The Takoma Horticulture Club has recently launched its new gardening information website and welcomes input from all readers of the Voice. Send your garden photographs or your favorite gardening books, mail order sources, or environmental links to me at harristakoma@erols.com, and I'll add them to the site.

Master Gardener Susan Harris writes about gardening for UDC's Cooperative Extension Service and teaches gardening privately; see - thegardeningcoach.com. She also blogs at gardenrant.com and takomagardener.typepad.com.

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