What do you make of him?

I mean, he's cool I guess.

I mean, I haven't really, you know, been that deep with him yet, so I can't exactly place him somewhere yet.

He's just someone I'm talking to right now, not, not exactly like someone I see as a dad or anything.

Just we're not yet there.

What are you hopeful for?

I'm hopeful for starting school maybe when I'm 21, and maybe getting to travel more and explore, and, uh, I can finally know myself, I can get to know myself as a person more expansively than just one part of myself.

So if there's a hypothetical person out there, which there surely will be listening to this podcast, what sort of things do they need to think about or consider as they, uh, start to think about approaching us as an organization? So what are the challenges that they're going to face? What are the ducks that they need to get in a row before they emerge as this fully formed professional horticulturalist?

Some of the conversations I've had with people have been around their confidence, um, around m- having the confidence, can I do it? I- will I fit in? Am I able to, to learn those skills and to make that transition? And I think being scaffolded by a scheme like this is really important way of doing that because you're working with people who share their knowledge, and gardeners are, are really generous people in terms of knowledge and time.

I mean, I, I'm often sort of asking you questions, "Should I do this? What do you think about that?" And I think that's really important.

Finance as well, I think it's very important to be realistic about it.

It is not a, a well-paid job in, in other things, and if you're coming out of office jobs, the- there is likely to be a difference in pay.

And, um, you do have to cut your coat according to your cloth, as, as the saying goes, and you have to be very realistic about finance, and that's another advantage of ours that you can continue with your existing role whilst training and earning and also earning through our scheme as well, which is a really good way of, of making that transition.

It's a tough job.

It's very emotive, isn't it? It's something you feel and something you live with, but when you try and verbalize it to other people, it's often quite difficult to pin down what, what it is that's so brilliant about it.

Euh, qu'est-ce que t'as pensé de toute l'idée de Catherine de, de, de changer le plan à la dernière minute, de se lever pour parler à tout le monde ?

Ben, c'est sûr que moi, je, c'était mon winner pick, Kate.

Fait que je suis un peu déçue de tout ça, mais c'était super bien joué, honnêtement, euh.

C'était, je pense, c'était, c'était la chose à faire pour elle, pour Catherine.

Elle a vraiment contrôlé le vote, elle a contrôlé avant, après, pendant.

Tu sais, puis j'ai trouvé aussi, je sais pas si tu trouves, mais elle a bien rattrapé ça par après.

C'est Kate, euh pas Kate, pardon, c'est Carolanne et Rémi qui ont pris tout le crédit [rire] de cette élimination-là, alors qu'ils n'ont rien à voir avec ça.

Je pense pas qu'elle ait fait de gros faux pas.

... a call.

Yeah.

He told me he was gonna tell.

"If you don't tell him, I will." [laughs] I'm like, "Miss Cathy's packed up her stuff, TV and all, through a third-floor window, and just eloped." And then I told them.

[laughs] Once, once I was out the house.

Yeah.

How did that work?

No, about a week later, you know, she tried looking for me.

So, um, w- what about next meetings? You know, like did you help start the, like the service structure there? Were you involved with the area?

Mm-hmm.

And, um, I'll just mention this one person.

Uh, she happens to be a nurse, and her name happened to be Nancy.

But she was an employee at, at DePaul.

And I just mention her because it's s- she was so helpful that she came to our first meetings.

'Cause sometimes if you're the one and only, uh, recovering person, it's easier to, for people, I think, to blow you off than if there's a couple people that are exchanging, you know, recovery ideas.

Oh, no

Um, so then do we ever feel pressure to recreate the bestsellers?

Yes.

I more so probably than you guys, because I always sit and wait on the reaction when something goes up.

And when something sells out very quickly, I'm very tempted to do it in another color, to repeat it, next year repeat it, and it, it makes my life a bit easier to repeat something than to start from scratch.

So maybe that's why I'm a bit more keen on it.

... on the product.

And now more than ever, we need to be s- with all that's going on in the world with fuel costs, we cannot be ordering stock in, like, just hand off.

I mean, it just doesn't, cannot happen anymore.

Takeaway, aha, or extension for today, or any connection you've made.

I'll go.

I think that this, today's session was especially beneficial to show how everything is connected, and for years teachers have looked at it the wrong way.

They've looked at it as a backwards model.

Like, the high school teachers have...

If the students aren't where they're supposed to be, rather than figure things out, the high school teachers tend to blame the middle school teachers, and the middle school teachers blame the elementary teachers, and the elementary blame the preschool teachers.

And what today's session did was totally upend that and say how important those fundamental skills are for all levels.

Uh, anything you've got.

Yeah.

I, I don't know that they intended the game plan to be, you know, defend for your life.

I, I think it just happened that way, um, out of circumstance.

And, uh, thank...

I mean, if that game had gone on another five, seven, nine minutes, it, it, it, it was inevitable.

I mean, you could... [chuckles] It, it was gonna happen.

What do you, what do you have for us, Cathy?

What do you want to feel and see from him going forward?

Well, I just want to feel that, you know, paternal love that I've never gotten.

Like, you know, just the normal things that you expect from a dad.

I feel like he just ignored me for 19 years, but I still need him in my own way.

So it's not too late, is it?

It's not too late.

I mean, I am still young, but he has missed a lot in my life.

Reaching adulthood, going through a lot of phases, a lot of complications, uh, joy, sadness, depression, and all that.

Cathy takes her mom's phone and starts scrolling through her Facebook account.

And I was like, "What's this she's telling me not to scroll on? Like, it's just Facebook." So I start scrolling and scrolling, and then all of a sudden I see someone with the same name as me, and I've never heard another name like mine, so I was like...

Mm.

But then I look back, then I'm like, "What if it's better that my mom raised me?" She's taught me to be confident.

She's taught me to be brave.

She's taught me everything.

She's taught me how to be myself, you know?

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Yeah

The rejection she felt from her father, from the other kids at school gnawed away at her.

Like, I could feel my, my heart hurting, and I felt like my lungs were on fire, 'cause I felt like screaming.

I felt like shouting.

I felt angry at everyone.

I felt angry at myself.

And then with the situation at home and everything else, um, I eventually learned about, like, self-harm.

I mean, it wasn't exactly pleasurable, but it made the emotional pain physical.

Cathy's self-harm escalated.

What do you make of him?

I mean, he's cool, I guess.

I mean, I haven't really, you know, been that deep with him yet, so I can't exactly place him somewhere yet.

He's just someone I'm talking to right now, not, not exactly like someone I see as a dad or anything.

Just we're not yet there.

What are you hopeful for?

I'm hopeful for starting school, maybe when I'm 21, and maybe getting to travel more and explore and, uh, I can finally know myself.

I can get to know myself as a person more expansively than just one part of myself.

[short jingle] Cathy grows up barely knowing anything about her father.

I've never really had like a dad, so to know what that feeling is to actually miss...

You can't miss something that you've never had.

But after searching Facebook late into the night, Cathy learns the truth—well, part of it—and discovers her father is alive.

So I start scrolling and scrolling, and then all of a sudden, I see someone with the same name as me.

Cathy takes her mom's phone and starts scrolling through her Facebook account.

And I was like, "What's this she's telling me not to scroll on? Like, it's just Facebook." So I start scrolling and scrolling, and then all of a sudden I see someone with the same name as me.

And I've never heard another name like mine, so I was like...

Mm.

But then I look back, then I'm like, "What if it's better that my mom raised me?" She's taught me to be confident.

She's taught me to be brave.

She's taught me everything.

She's taught me how to be myself, you know?

[gentle music] Cathy grows up barely knowing anything about her father.

I've never really had, like, a dad, so to know what that feeling is to actually miss, you can't miss something that you've never had.

But after searching Facebook late into the night, Cathy learns the truth, well, part of it, and discovers her father is alive.

So I start scrolling and scrolling, and then all of a sudden I see someone with the same name as me.

And the other weird thing in there was it was cold.

It was.

It was appreciably colder.

Now, can we blame that on weird air conditioning that m- makes that room colder than another room? I, I don't know.

Maybe.

But it, it definitely was colder.

And we mentioned that, and the girl said, "Yeah, it, it's always colder in this room." Um, she also was able to pull out her phone and show us some kind of strange, uh, shadow-type thing.

[laughs] I don't know.

Oh.

And, uh, left a young family, a devastated husband, and a very sad community, uh, that she was a very much a part of.

So a couple of years after she passed away I had this dream, and it was that I bumped into her in the hallway at the school, and she was just going 20 miles an hour, almost like she was planning a event or something, and she was moving really fast.

And I was aware that she shouldn't be there in my dream, and I stopped her and just to say a name, I was like, "Jane, oh my gosh, what are you doing here? How are you?" And she wouldn't stop for me, and so I was literally following her like a duckling, trying to, "Well, how are you? Where have you been?" Or, "What do you..." You know, and try asking her all these questions, and she wouldn't acknowledge me.

And so she finally turned and hit the steps, and again, I'm following her going, "How are you? Are you okay? Oh my gosh, this is amazing." And you know those stairs where you start up and then there's a landing and then you proceed to go further up the stairs?

[laughs]

And they couldn't get the bird out, and they couldn't get it whatever, and they bird, they get that bird out.

And so fine.