Today we celebrate a man who changed his personal beliefs and life philosophy after studying nature. We'll also learn about a woman who writes about her lifelong relationship with the garden. We hear an excerpt about the spring garden with a bit of empathy for what it is like to be a weed. We Grow That Garden Library™ with a fabulous reference for plant identification. And then we’ll wrap things up with the son of a gardener who grew to love plants and nature and became one of America’s best-loved poets.   Subscribe Apple | Google | Spotify | Stitcher | iHeart To listen to the show while you're at home, just ask Alexa or Google to “Play the latest episode of The Daily Gardener Podcast.” And she will. It's just that easy.   The Daily Gardener Friday Newsletter Sign up for the FREE Friday Newsletter featuring: A personal update from me Garden-related items for your calendar The Grow That Garden Library™ featured books for the week Gardener gift ideas Garden-inspired recipes Exclusive updates regarding the show Plus, each week, one lucky subscriber wins a book from the Grow That Garden Library™ bookshelf.   Gardener Greetings Send your garden pics, stories, birthday wishes, and so forth to Jennifer@theDailyGardener.org   Curated News DIY Strawberry Rocks | Washington Gardener | Kathy Jentz   Facebook Group If you'd like to check out my curated news articles and original blog posts for yourself, you're in luck. I share all of it with the Listener Community in the Free Facebook Group - The Daily Gardener Community. So, there’s no need to take notes or search for links. The next time you're on Facebook, search for Daily Gardener Community, where you’d search for a friend... and request to join. I'd love to meet you in the group.   Important Events May 25, 1803 Today is the birthday of the American transcendentalist, essayist, philosopher, and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson. Ralph Waldo Emerson was a son of Boston. By the time he finished his schooling at Harvard, he had decided to go by his middle name, Waldo. He was his class poet, and he wrote an original poem for his graduation. Six years later, on Christmas Day, he would meet his first wife, Ellen. Two years later, he lost her to tuberculosis. Her death eventually made him a wealthy man — although he had to sue his inlaws to acquire the inheritance. Deeply grieved after losing Ellen, Waldo eventually traveled to Europe, where he visited the Royal Botanical Garden in Paris. The experience was a revelation to him. At the Paris Garden, Waldo sees plants organized according to Jussieu's system of classification. Suddenly he can see connections between different species. The American historian and biographer. Robert D. Richardson wrote, "Emerson's moment of insight into the interconnectedness of things in the Jardin des Plantes was a moment of almost visionary intensity that pointed him away from theology and toward science". Upon his return to the states, Waldo befriended other forward thinkers and writers of his time: William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Thomas Carlyle. In 1835, Waldo married his second wife, Lydia Jackson. Waldo changed her name from Lydia to Lidian, and he calls her by other names like Queenie and Asia. She always calls him “Mr. Emerson.” Around this time, Waldo began to think differently about the world and his perspective on life. Waldo was also the son of a minister, which makes his move away from religion and societal beliefs all the more impressive. By 1836, Waldo published his philosophy of transcendentalism in an essay he titled "Nature." He wrote: "Nature is a language and every new fact one learns is a new word; but it is not a language taken to pieces and dead in the dictionary, but the language put together into a most significant and universal sense. I wish to learn this language, not that I may know a new grammar, but that I may read the great book that is written in that tongue." The next year, Waldo gave a speech called "The American Sch