Before I sold my pond business and retired, I often did lectures and presentations at the various garden shows in New Orleans. Probably the ones that were the most fun were the City Park/botanical garden Spring garden shows in the spring and fall.
One spring, the famous Felder Rushing of bottle tree fame was speaking at 11:00am. I was speaking at 10:00am. I always had a good crowd at one of my presentations, but was surprised to see standing room only this time. Folks crowded in.
I finished my 40 or so minutes about how to build a pond and opened the discussion for questions. There were very few, so at the end of my appointed time, I packed up my slides and got ready to leave. Most of the time, people followed me out to ask individual questions and I was happily detained for at least another ½ hour. Not this time. No one followed me out, no questions were asked. The audience did not move.
I could not figure out what was going on. I chatted with Felder for a moment, but time was short and so were our remarks. I looked for a seat to hear him, but was unsuccessful.
As I was leaving, it finally dawned on me. All those people were not there to hear and see me, the pondlady. They were trying to get a good seat to hear Felder Rushing. Talk about being a sobering experience. I had to laugh.
But like Felder, I have written a book, A Practical Guide to Building and Maintaining your Pond. You can buy it here
And for lots of pond info and and interactive forum, check out my website at pondlady.com
