Lil’ icon’s childhood garden

In the words of Rajiv Fernandez, the talent behind Lil’Icon’s illustrations, "When I think of Freedom Gardens, it takes me back to when I was a kid and catching my father in a love affair - with his victory garden. All things around the house were devoted to the garden: the composting and dealing with maggots; saving the mowed grass clippings to lay down pathways between the beds; and shoveling a truckload of manure for organic soil. TV shows were preempted every Saturday afternoon to watch Victory Garden on PBS. And there were weekend trips to Earl May, Iowa's leading garden center where the whole staff knew him by name, to buy vegetables seeds not found in the grocery store, like blue potatoes, belgian endives and Japanese daikon radish. It was a regular occurance for him to rush home from work as the sun set, still dressed in a full suit, delicately squatting to not get it dirty, to pick his homegrown vegetables. An addition to the house centered around a greenhouse where wintertime gardening was done under fluorescent lights. A doctor and father, he put a lot of passion into the things he loved. But his patients nor his family could compete with his not-so-secret love affair I saw everyday of my life, his garden. It was a place where the only prescription was for wellness, it was where he wasn't judged for how he dressed. His garden was his place where he was free."