MARY, MARY QUITE CONTRARY....

How does MY garden grow?  Well, typically not that great.  But this year, I don't know, something has taken root within me and I am A GARDENING ADDICT!

I think it was the slow water torture of many years of observing friends devoting themselves to flower and vegetable gardening so vocally and passionately.  Or maybe it's me (at last!) putting down all the gardening magazines, articles, newspaper clippings, and Pintrest posts showing lush and beautiful gardens, and deciding, YES I CAN!

My previous attempts have not been pretty.  But then, I didn't try very hard.  This year we've begun to implement the "30-years on the to-do list" landscaping plan in our side yard.  We cut out part of the vast expanse of lawn on one side of the house and created berms that are the Phase I of a multi-phase plan for re-imagining that part of our property.

I've called in the experts -- a small team friends, gardening veterans all, who have come over to see my  empty dirt and make recommendations about what to plant where.  I've made a new friend at a local nursery who has agreed to be "on call" for me (and probably hundreds of others who frequent her nursery and value her knowledge).

I am so delighted by all of this that I got seriously motivated and started to plant trees, shrubs and perennials that I actually hope will grow.  I am watering and feeding, tending, and fretting.  I also have a little raised bed vegetable garden and those afore-posted-about tomato plants on the back deck (update coming soon!)

And, I have a suspicion there is more going on here than just a sudden wake-up call to the joys and challenges of gardening.  It just feels different.... I feel different.

First, how long was I planning to get to this "someday"?  I'm not gettin' any younger!  All those years of pouring over gardening magazines and books was not going to get the job done.  I had to admit it; I wanted a garden, not just a lot of pretty pictures.

Next, I am aware that I have a need to "mother" something in my home.  My children are grown, the dog and cat are dead, the bird feeder at the front porch was fun but way too messy and drew critters I DID NOT want hanging around, my houseplants are healthy, happy, and not very needy anymore -- but an outdoor garden?  Now there was something I could take under my maternal wing and NURTURE!

And then there is the whole mortality thing that is never far from my mind.  I feel like planting the trees, especially, is planting something that will live on after I am gone.  I am planting something the earth will nourish and will be nourished by.  I am leaving a legacy.  I am creating something beautiful.  I am intimately involved in the circle of the seasons -- the life and death cycle of which everything is a part.  It feels calming and comforting; a reminder that I am just a cog in big, giant wheel that will go on and on in one way or another.... the Grand Garden of Life, Death, and Rebirth.

At least, that's the view from here....©