West Texas Cancer Center honored for garden

Keep Odessa Beautiful presented its Odessa Pride Star of the Month Business Beautification award to the Texas Oncology-West Texas Cancer Center at Medical Center Hospital for the month of June in a ceremony at The Healing Garden on June 9.
 Kathy Rhodes, board member of Keep Odessa Beautiful, presented the award, saying she has a special connection to the Center and to the garden because she is a breast cancer survivor of eight years.
 Established two years ago, the garden is intended as a place where patients and family members "come and sit and find a beautiful green space," says patient counselor Mary Collier. Patients inside the Cancer Center can see the garden from their windows as they receive treatment.
 When Ginger Pope designed the garden, she thought about the people taking treatments.
 "I asked myself, if I didn't want to be there, where would I want to be," she says. "I hope that those who are inside can imagine themselves out here - that looking at the garden takes their minds off what they're going through."
 Pope's design incorporates hardy shrubs, trees and blooming plants, a netafim watering system, a wide walkway that accommodates wheelchairs, and a waterfall. Wind chimes and the smell of herbs such as rosemary add to the sensory experience.
 "The garden is enclosed by four walls, so it stays warmer during the cooler months and is protected from our West Texas wind," Pope says.
 A recent addition to the garden is 50 land tortoises that occasionally poke their heads out for a peek at visitors.
   "Visitor reaction is often, ‘Look! Look at the turtle!' or the hummingbird or the butterfly. It draws you in, as any garden is supposed to," Pope says.
    Collier frequently uses the garden as a place for counseling patients, some of whom participate in art therapy or journal writing. "They can write out their thoughts and plan their future here," she says.
 The Odessa City Council presented the West Texas Cancer Center with a citation for its beautification efforts at its regular meeting that evening.