ruderals in my garden have rights

Today I've come across a word I've been needing for years. But I didn't know I needed it. The word is ruderals.

I'm reading a book, Gardening Philosophy for Everyone, that has literally changed the way I see the world. I enjoyed the first chapter, 'The Virtues of Gardening', because it validates my belief that it is a 'good thing' to garden - more about that another time. However, it's chapter three, 'Escaping Eden - Plant Ethics in a Gardener's World', that has allowed me to realise that plants, too, are living, autonomous beings, entitled to consideration from humans.

I try to live in harmony with the environment, enriching the soil of my garden with natural substances and caring for the soil, but since I've read this chapter it's as if my eyes are open to the life force of the plants around me and I see them more vividly. I'm loving the experience.

What we call weeds are also entitled to our consideration.

In order to overcome exclusion and human mastery of the plant kingdom and the natural world, care, attention, and responsibility need to be extended outwards from our "cultivated" plants towards those plants that keep on coming back into our Edens from the wild lands outside... [This] requires giving over space to those plant lives that make their way into our gardens of their own accord: the wildflowers, grasses, climbers, and ruderals. It requires giving space and being open to the spontaneous arrivals and actions of plants that are not completely under human control. Setting aside space for plants to grow unchecked can help transform Eden from a human orientated space into one that is at the forefront of ethical reparations to the natural world.

Hmm...I will have to think about this. I've certainly got plenty of plants in my garden that arrived of their own accord, and when I recognise a seedling as useful to me, I tend it. But to allow that pesky Blue Periwinkle to spread around my garden is a big ask.

On the other hand, if I just keep it in check and let it have a corner of the yard, maybe I could make life easier for myself.

And what are these ruderals?

After consulting the Online Macquarie Dictionary I discover:

ruderal - adjective - growing near human habitations in waste places. [New Latin rūderālis, from Latin rūder-, rūdus broken stone, rubble]

Definitions.net says:

1. (adj.) ruderal
(of a plant) growing in waste places, along roadsides, or in rubbish.

2. (n.) ruderal
a ruderal plant.

Etymology: (1855–60; < NL rūderālis < L rūder- (s. of rūdus broken stone, rubble)

Aha! Those periwinkles are ruderals. They're creeping under my fence from the untended laneway at the back of our property.

Since I've learned this word I seem to see vacant land everywhere, carpeted with living green. (We've had good rain the last few months, thank goodness.)

It's all in the name, as I've said before about weeds.

origin of the word 'cynic'

Since I've been living with a dog I've often thought about some of the things we humans take for granted - for instance our dependence on our sense of sight, our enjoyment of 'good manners', our constant worrying about the future. Dogs don't care about things like that and seem all the happier for it.

In Stanley Coren's book, 'How Dogs Think', he says:

Plato's contemporary Diogenes, another significant Greek philosopher, although more eccentric than most, became known for wandering the world with a lamp claiming to be "looking for an honest man." While he had his doubts about humans, Diogenes thought dogs were extremely moral and adopted the nickname "Cyon", which means "Dog". He would go on to found one of the great ancient schools of philosophy, and he and his followers would become known by his nickname as "Cynics" or "Dog Thinkers." Diogenes' own intelligence and wit were such that Alexander the Great, after meeting him in Corinth, went away saying, "If I were not Alexander, I should wish to be Diogenes."

When Diogenes died, the people of Athens raised a great marble pillar in his memory. On top of the pillar was the image of a dog. Beneath the dog there was a long inscription that started with the following bit of conversation:
"Say, Dog, I pray, what guard you in that tomb?'
"A dog."
"His name?"
"Diogenes."

Coren presents this information as part of a discussion of humanity's changing attitudes over time to the question of the dog's intelligence and ability to feel emotion. In Coren's version, Diogenes adopted the name out of respect for the dog.

The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosopy, on the other hand, says

the term may have begun as an insult referring to Diogenes’ style of life, especially his proclivity to perform all of his activities in public. Shamelessness, which allowed Diogenes to use any space for any purpose, was primary in the invention of “Diogenes the Dog.”

The precise source of the term “Cynic” is, however, less important than the wholehearted appropriation of it. The first Cynics, beginning most clearly with Diogenes of Sinope, embraced their title: they barked at those who displeased them, spurned Athenian etiquette, and lived from nature. In other words, what may have originated as a disparaging label became the designation of a philosophical vocation.