Across The Yard
Across the yard a garden grew,
And bent among the flowers,
A spare old man stooped to his task
Or he sat and dreamed for hours.
- Frances Strawn Livingston, from The Garden
The first time I turned fallow ground to make a garden was almost twenty years ago when an elderly woman chided me — right there in front of God and everybody — chided me for overlooking such a fine, albeit small, bit of ground.
We spent the next hour talking about What Could Be and I fell in love with her cantankerous spirit and the idea of watching something, anything, grow. Later that same afternoon, I returned from the local nursery with big plans and an equally big dent in my checking account.
But it was love.
That first garden was right outside the studio where I worked and provided me daily respite when I needed a distraction and some manner of pause. It was a flower garden, that one. I learned a lot tending it. I honestly don’t know how one can’t absorb all kinds of lessons in working soil, but believe me, the notion escapes a great many.
In fact, one summer morning in particular, I was visited by a friend of mine, a pastor, who found me weeding and chastising a rose bush too timid too bloom (it worked too). This friend arrested my attention with, “…why in the world are you gardening?”
I couldn’t believe the question. From a pastor no less.
[staring] “…are you kidding me?”
“No…I mean *chuckling* ‘gardening.’ Really?”
“Hm. I would have thought the Genesis poem, and All Things starting in one, would have dawned over your mind by now.”
And that arrested his attention.
Today we’re having the first, true, warm Spring day of 2010. And I couldn’t be happier. It’s Palm Sunday too, and I happen to love that. Easter is, without rival, my favorite holiday of the year. And for all the reasons with which you can infuse the very obvious: All Things New (not All New Things). All. Things. New.
I commemorated the blue sky and sunshine with a spade in hand and a soil testing kit in my back pocket (I’ll update you all on the results in the next post). Even though there remain patches of snow on the ground, protected only by the shadows the sun can’t reach, it felt downright triumphant to stand on the edge of the garden and survey what’s coming.
I dream of dark, rich loam (and I’ll have it)
neatly spaced rows (and I’ll them too as long as I get to plant them and not Cute Redhead) (don’t get me started)
breaks from every day where I’ll walk across the yard and spend a few minutes, every day, weeding this, thinning that
colors
onions and
tomatoes and
beans and
broccoli and
carrots and
squash and
cucumber and
pumpkins and
corn and
herbs and
marigolds (keeps the rabbits if you plant them on the edges)
And I think of…
…Veronique, in New Zealand, who’s infectious spirit and her love of walking in the outdoors gives tribute to There Is No Better Way To Spend A Sunday. She’s an inspiration to me.
…John, in Wisconsin, who’s This Close to trading it all in to grow blueberries and spend his days Slowing Very Down.
…Carl in New Jersey, who happens to be a fine gardener and landscape architect, and who’s promised me all the advice I want.
…and Jill, in Los Angeles, who is one of the bravest people I know, and who’s setting out to defy her past in order to write her future.
Here’s to Spring, everybody.
And to All Things New.
Thanks for the shout out.
NJ IS the Garden State, btw.
Good luck!
We close on our first house in 12 hours and I fully intend on having a garden. It will be good to work the ground. (I say this now.)
For the record, he can’t grow blueberries quite yet. I need him at the office. That is, of course, unless you’ve got $50 million for me to manage… Good thing I’m licensed in CO. I guess this counts as solicitation. (keep it clean folks.)
Mike, congratulations on your new home! And what if I only work him over the weekend and have him in the office by Monday morning?
I like Todd’s plan best, (as long as “the weekend” starts Thursday around 3 pm).