Confessions of a Bratty Gardener

I started gardening when I was a little kid, then took a break until I was about 19. Between 19 and 25 I took gardening like a vitamin. I absorbed it every way I could. But everyone knows that people in that age range are dumb as a bag of red lava rock. I wish I could have told my younger self:

Sunblock, dummy. You'll want more tattoos later and those freckles make for an awful canvas.
Stop with the "I hate ________". You sound ignorant to other gardeners and you will have to eat your words, missy! Remember the years you told people that you didn't waste your time playing with annuals? Well, you'll change your mind SO HARD that you will beg Proven Winners for a gig blogging on their site because you have a so much good to say about annuals that you need an outlet (like how much I love
Superbells^{^®} Blackcurrant Punch^™ Calibrachoa or Proven Accents^{^®} Sweet Caroline Raven^™ Ornamental Sweet Potato Vine or Supertunia^{^®} Picasso in Purple^{^®}Petunia)
You also went through an "I hate variegation" phase and "I hate perennial grasses" phase. And now look at your collection of...ahem... variegated grasses.
When someone asks you if you know how to water, DO NOT LAUGH AT THEM. You never thought about it while you were sprinkling away trying to act like Mother Nature, making it rain up in here. Water the ground, not the air. Roots need water, but water on leaves makes powdery mildew.

Lily is spelled with 2 "L's” not 3.

Lest you think I did everything wrong, I did not. I spent all those years solely focused on plants that did more than 3 things right, like stuff that gets great flowers, fall color and also keeps away rhinoceroses. Now I know that there is WAY more fun in the world than that....