Talking Up the Customers

Bonsai is a fairly solitary activity. When you work on a little tree the rest of the world goes away for a while, and it's just you and the plant having a metaphorical back-and-forth conversation. I'm a solitary sort of person, strongly inclined towards quiet introspection, with an unfortunate tendency to be cranky in social situations. I might be tempted to say I'd like my job even more if all it involved was working with the plants, were it not for a certain mysterious phenomenon that occurs on a regular basis. When I'm in the bonsai garden and guests are passing through, I feel a responsibility to interact with them. That is to say, it starts as out as a responsibility but often enough ends up more like an uncharacteristically friendly compulsion.

It's necessary for me to work in the garden on a regular basis during the growing season. For one thing, the plants need to be watered and sometimes that has to happen during visiting hours. The trees are actively growing now, as well, and the pruning never stops. A small bonsai on display might be taken away to someplace quiet to be worked upon, but that would add more time to the job and time is usually at a premium. Some bonsai specimens are so large and heavy that moving them around is impracticable, so there really isn't much choice but to work on them right where they sit, out on the display bench. In either case — pulling a hose around to do the watering or pruning a tree that's on display — the activity draws attention from visitors and identifies the person doing the work as being someone who can answer questions. The visitors have a lot of questions. If someone asks me a question while I'm out in the garden working, I'm obliged to answer. The questions are mostly all the same, consisting of a set of maybe a half dozen or so, with a number of variations — How often do you have to water them? Can any tree be made into a bonsai? Do you have to bring them inside in the winter? Do different people own these trees? Do bonsai require a lot of care? Then there's the most common question, and my least favorite — How old are some of these trees? How old is that one you're working on? Why don't you have a sign saying what the ages are? What's the oldest bonsai you have? These are all very old, right? It's enough to make a cranky introvert run and hide.

Here's something I know but always have to remind myself: People ask questions when they're interested in something. The question I've heard a million times is new to the person asking it. I want people to enjoy the experience of coming to the Arboretum's bonsai garden and answering their questions is a way to enhance their experience. So I answer the questions and do my best to not get snappish when asked how old it is. Sometimes I do get a little snappish, but then I usually feel immediately bad about it and make a point of doubling back to the person who asked and engaging them a little more in a friendlier tone.

The bonsai these people come to see, these novel little trees that prompt their questions, are the product of my work. In a manner of thinking, the people who walk into the bonsai garden are my customers. I want my customers to come back. I want them to write a favorable review on a website, to tell their friends how interesting it was to see the bonsai, to make a point of bringing their out-of-town guests to the garden to share this special place we have in Asheville. In that sense, my interacting with visitors is simply self-serving. I'm participating in the time honored shopkeeper's tradition of "talking up the customers."

But there's more to it than that. On a regular basis, once I'm identified as someone who works there, the visitors express how much they appreciate the bonsai garden. The comments are unsolicited and apparently quite sincere — What a beautiful garden! This place is amazing! I've never seen bonsai like these! This is our favorite part of the Arboretum! You're so lucky to work here! Thank you for what you do!

Answering the same questions over and over can be a chore that demands patience. Being continually complimented on your work — to the point of being thanked for doing it — somehow never gets old. The positive energy of these favorable comments, the look of engagement and enjoyment plainly evident in the faces of even those who don't make comments, is contagious. I find myself being uplifted in attitude. I see a person, or a couple, or a family, or a group, happily animated by the experience of visiting the bonsai garden and I can't help but say something to them. Usually all I have to say is "Hi, how are you doing?" They smile, they say they're doing fine, then they offer an affirmation — This is wonderful!

What shopkeeper wouldn't be pleased with so many satisfied customers?

Let's be honest. Arboretum visitors are customers only in an abstracted sense of the word. Yes, when people come here they have to pay something in the form of a parking fee or the price of Membership. But all we are really "selling" is a positive experience, with hopefully a heaping helping of educational content thrown into the bargain. The folks who come to the Arboretum are often on vacation, or taking a weekend outing, or they are locals who know the Arboretum is a beautiful place to go for a walk and enjoy being out in cultivated nature. Our customers are predisposed to having a good time when they visit us.

None of that changes the fact that for this introverted crank, rubbing elbows with the public in the bonsai garden is often a mystifyingly satisfying social experience. It makes me feel happy. Being out among all those people who are connecting to nature in a way they hadn't previously imagined, or coming back to do it again because they enjoyed it so much the last time, energizes me. I feed off of their positive energy and feel compelled to complete the circuit, sending that good feeling right back at them. A coworker who happened to be out in the garden with me one time when I was talking up the customers took a sarcastic poke at me after the visitors moved on: "You really like being Mayor of Bonsai Town, don't you?" I took the joke in stride. Being goodwill ambassador for the part of the Arboretum that so thoroughly fulfills our mission of connecting "people, plants and places" isn't a bad job to have.