When I was young, walking was exercise. Now my partner and I may take walks to get out of the house, but we plot our course based on the gardens we want to revisit and stop long enough at each that we achieve no aerobic exercise. We walk quickly past the houses that are clearly maintained by the mow and blow workers. They are all alike, great expanses of green clipped short as a golf course, flowers contained in perfect rows and catalogued by color. There is no personal touch, no evidence of a gardener. Two blocks up the hill, we tarry at the yard with three kinds of lavender, rubbing the purple blossoms and breathing in the spiciness; stretch our arms wide underneath the grand oak three blocks over; point out new pink geranium in the cottage garden a few blocks south. “Look at this gorgeous yard,” I say, stopping. “I wonder what lucky people live here.” Sun pokes me with an elbow. We are home.
When we first bought our little bungalow, the yard surrounded by a white wrought iron fence was solid St. Augustine, the rugged thick carpet of green that so many of our neighbors adore. It will grow anywhere and spread everywhere, under soil leaching Mulberry trees and across cement. The first project, even before we started refinishing the floors inside, was digging out great expanses of the “perfectly good sod” and starting our cottage garden. For the last three years, we have woven the people in our lives into these beds, a daily reminder of our family friends. Sun’s mom got us started with coreopsis, gaillardia, lambs ears, and iris from her garden. Another friend gave us violets, Mexican Primrose, and even a surprise Japanese anemone. When the glads come up, I phone Michael, who gave us the bulbs when we left Humboldt County. We talk each other through our gardens, feeling connected by bloom and season, successes and disappointments.
Many people in our community stop to talk when I am out working in our cottage garden, and most lament about the yard on the other side of our garage. “Your yard is coming along nicely,” one woman said. “It’s too bad about those neighbors.” I explained that there are no neighbors; the scraggly weed-ridden lot is part of our property and has posed a problem for us, its borders less defined and a plan harder to sketch out. Our gardening cohorts see endless possibilities. “Put in more fruit trees!” “Wouldn’t an arbor be nice?” In the spring we scour the Descanso and Huntington plant sales for suitable natives, salvia and buddleia, plants who will survive with little water. We cannot resist looking at all of the plants, picking up abutilon, a flowering maple, for their lantern-like yellow and orange blossoms. The work we do does not make a dent, and the next trip to Rainbow Nursery brings friendly criticism from the owner. “Your yard looks awful,” he says. “It looks awesome,” I counter. “I walked by there yesterday and it’s all weeds,” he insists. “Don’t count on it changing until September,” I say. I have done my reading and know better than to plant during the inhospitable summer months. We will get busy when winter temperatures will allow new additions to rest and settle in. These additions will not bring instant gratification, but I have also learned that, gardening takes patience, but come spring, we will be rewarded.
For every person excited about our progress, there is another who asks when we are going to rip out the small house and use our land to build a real house. Two blocks east, a lot our size is getting two “real houses.” They must be 2,000 square feet apiece. We can see grand curving staircases through still-empty doorways. I’m sure the family will enjoy their indoor, air-conditioned clean space. They will need air conditioning without the two oaks that used to shade the property. On our own property we have added a trellis and climbing vines to cool our house. Across the alley, the once-a-month mower and weed-eater could care less that this addition cooled our house at least ten degrees last summer. As I prune back the Cecil Brunner, he appears. “I was wondering when you were going to get out here and trim. You know, you can’t let your plants grow out into the alley.” I am speechless and left to wonder if he is the one responsible for the tire track through the thick nasturtiums. Our whole stretch of alley has greened so nicely now that the honeysuckle has covered the six-foot fence, softening the border between us and the Southland attitude.
The neighbor is as unknowing as the electrician who insisted that we needed an outlet for our sink to run a garbage disposal and looked clueless when I said we didn’t need one. “We compost,” I explained, seeing nutrients re-enter the earth. He truly sees garbage. I want to pull him out to the black bin, pry open the door and place some of the dark, rich soil into his hands. What a triumph that handful of dirt is after a year and a half of nothing. “Put in your grass clippings,” Sun’s dad said. “Keep it wet,” her aunt suggested. Then when I started adding last year’s leaf mold project into the mixture, I got heat and moisture and bugs and results! I have created a home for the worms who will keep my plants healthy. In the back of my mind is the memory that Michael trucked in horse manure to speed the composting process. I will have to buy a truck to get my own manure. This does not sound unreasonable, even to my ever-frugal self.
Who is this person? My Saturdays have evolved from spending all day mowing and tending to what lawn we do have to getting through that task as quickly as possible so I can get to planting, pruning, and propagating. Some days I am so muddy from my morning tasks that Sun will not let me in to pee. “Shed the pants and boots or go down to Starbucks,” she teases, eyeing my earth-covered lower half. I have been packing the soil around the new avocado whispering encouragement to the roots. Please feel at home here. Feel the warmth and nutrients pressed against your roots. Press back into our soil. Spread your roots and bring us fruit. Give to this land as we do. We will live off of this land, planting ourselves as we create an ecosystem that feels right to us.
Some days, our neighbors and I arrive home at the same time. We nod at each other as I remove my helmet, but they are already inside when I emerge from the garage. Bag still slung over my shoulder, I snack through the vegetable garden on strawberries or snap peas. I swing through the back gate and check the progress of the creeping thyme and rub a soft ear of chocolate mint to release its smell. I hear the music of finches at play in our mallow hedge. I breathe peace.
No comments:
Post a Comment