Dave Miller was hard at work yesterday afternoon, preparing the planters at his business, Charlie’s Corner, as his wife, proprietor Brenda Miller, cut hair inside.
“I like getting my hands in the dirt,” he said, shuffling fertilizer in the planter around.
While the city of El Dorado maintains the planters along the sides of the streets surrounding the Union County Courthouse, as well as the garden beds at the courthouse, downtown business owners are responsible for the planters at their businesses.
Miller, a registered forester, has maintained the flowers at Charlie’s Corner since he and his wife were married over 20 years ago. At his home on Mt. Holly Road, deer and hogs make his property hard to garden, since they eat or trample what he tries to grow.
“I just quit gardening out there until I get a really good fence, because it’s useless. They eat it all up. We’re done with gardening out there,” he said. “All the plants I have out at my house are some tomatoes and one pot[ted plant].”
For over 30 years, Miller was employed by Georgia-Pacific. When the company was purchased by Koch Industries in 2005, he was laid off, along with many other GP employees here.
Miller was able to bounce back, quickly finding a job with Stevens Forestry Service, Inc., where he still works on a part-time basis. There, he met another GP employee who was laid off, who he still works with today.
“It’s been a very rewarding career, and I haven’t really decided when I’m going to hang it up,” he said. He’s been with Steven’s Forestry for 13 and a half years, he said.
In his years of maintaining the planters at Charlie’s Corner and living on Mt. Holly, Miller has seen more littering or larger-scale dumping than he ever cared to.
“People walk down here and they seem to think garbage and cigarette butts are what belong in these planters,” he said.
However, Miller has an eye for beautification. Where he’d already completed his work in one of the shop’s planters, tall hostas hung over red and green coleus plants, red impatiens and pink begonias, evoking the feeling of a vividly colorful prehistoric forest.
Miller also planned to diversify some of the city’s planters, which he said were in danger because some of the flowers were planted too close together.
“I’ll add some up here for color [too],” he said. “They planted everything white.”
Miller is not a Master Gardener, despite his eye for gardening and arrangement. He said he missed this year’s class, which is a required course for those hoping to join the group.
He said working in forestry and practicing gardening has been very fulfilling for him.
“I can go out and see what I’ve accomplished,” he said. “I’ve left that property, I’ve left that timberland better than it used to be.”
There was only one thing Miller would have preferred doing yesterday afternoon.
“I oughta be sitting in a chair watching Arkansas baseball,” he said with a laugh.
Caitlan Butler can be reached at 870-862-6611 or [email protected].