Meg Buerkel Hunn, Advisory Council Chair: We Share Much More Than What Divides Us

These two plants, to the gardener’s eye, are quite different…  Obviously, one is a cactus, the other a lettuce.  The leaves of one deter close interactions, the leaves of the other are delicious, especially with some bleu cheese dressing!  One likely took decades to reach this size – the other, of similar size, took weeks to grow this large.  One is in my backyard garden where it is both shaded and irrigated, the other I saw while hiking in the Ojito Wilderness area, it’s in full sun and trusts in New Mexico’s sporadic rainfalls.  One is cold-hardy and heat tolerant, while the other is much more finicky.

Even with all these things separating these two, they are even more alike.  Both are green – they have miraculous chlorophyll that transforms the sun’s rays into food.  Both have roots that soak in moisture and keep them grounded.  Both require water to live.  Both put forth flowers.  Both have leaves and are circular – maybe even growing in a sort of Fibonacci spiral.  Both breathe in carbon dioxide and exhale oxygen.  When one ‘digs down’ even further, their chromosomes don’t even differ all that much.

We, humans, are like these plants.  Even though each of us is quite different,  when we dig down, we are more similar than we appear.  We all have needs – food, water, air, and a suitable place to belong.  Let’s remember this as we come together – to grow gardens, to live life, to govern our country.  We share much more than what divides us.