Thanks to my industrious husband, we now have a fence around our yard, a sandbox in the middle of it, and a lawn cleared of last fall's leaves. Our little family has already nestled down in the comforting confines of chicken wire. We are staking out a corner of upstate springtime. In a small garden patch bordered by rocks picked from the endless underground supply, perennials chosen from the nursery shelves by Eliot pop pinks and purples into the fresh brownish-green. Along the fenceline, a few gladiola bulbs and creekbed lilies offered up by a camp neighbor promise a splash of light in summer.
After four years of living in high desert, I was a giddy about the move to a deciduous forest. I'd had it with fried sage, mullen orgies and invasive thistle. The possibility of a garden made my heart gallop. I entertained wild, slightly naughty fantasies about pole beans. Knowing we would start jumping back and forth between our New York camp and another camp in Massachusetts in 2010, I figured this summer would be my first and last chance. Oh, visions of glossy spinach unfurling from luscious brown soil. Pulling a trellis a green bean slighly furred and glistening with dew. Goosebumps.
We hauled ourselves across the country and into our new home right in the heart of winter. Snow fell in heaps. Who knew what lay beneath? We shoveled. Crossed our fingers. Chipped ice from the porch. Bit our nails. Raked snowy clods of leaves away. Then, we dug.
Sadly, the soil around our house is mostly sand. Anthills abound. A dense skeleton of rock holds up the earth here, just inches below the soft skin. Life, however, finds its way. A little grass pokes up in patches, and the hostas with their legendary local reputation begin to curl open along unexpected corners of the foundation. I dug up my little patch. Made room for flox. And who, with a toddler, a dog, a cat, a deer convention in the neighborhood, and a fleet of Tonka trucks can expect to keep lettuce safe in the backyard?
But what I had not counted on was the wall. Around the base of our house, extending back behind the foundation of the main floor, is a stone wall. It stretches fifteen feet or so below the deck as the hillside drops off into anthills and, eventually, a creekbed. Then it jogs and stretches another fifteen feet or so along the back of the house. Above this stone wall and below the deck is a huge patch of scary-looking dirt. I assumed this dirt sat atop a stone foundation of the house. But, now cleared of soggy leaves and an old canoe, I have discovered the wall is simply that: a wall. It holds up a lot of really soft, squishy, deliciously chocolatey soil. Safely separated from the rest of the yard by a stretch of chicken wire, neither dog nor toddler can reach it. And, six feet off the ground, no deer will likely try.
So, today, with my onion starts and seed packets, I scaled a stepladder and dug trenches in freshly raked soil. My garden is just a teeny stretch about ten feet long and two feet wide. And I had to balance along atop crumbling stone wall to drop my seeds in their waiting furrows. But I will gladly clamber and wobble up there with my watering can and my spade if it means the possibility of tearing lettuce fresh from the earth into a salad bowl for my family.
After four years of living in high desert, I was a giddy about the move to a deciduous forest. I'd had it with fried sage, mullen orgies and invasive thistle. The possibility of a garden made my heart gallop. I entertained wild, slightly naughty fantasies about pole beans. Knowing we would start jumping back and forth between our New York camp and another camp in Massachusetts in 2010, I figured this summer would be my first and last chance. Oh, visions of glossy spinach unfurling from luscious brown soil. Pulling a trellis a green bean slighly furred and glistening with dew. Goosebumps.
We hauled ourselves across the country and into our new home right in the heart of winter. Snow fell in heaps. Who knew what lay beneath? We shoveled. Crossed our fingers. Chipped ice from the porch. Bit our nails. Raked snowy clods of leaves away. Then, we dug.
Sadly, the soil around our house is mostly sand. Anthills abound. A dense skeleton of rock holds up the earth here, just inches below the soft skin. Life, however, finds its way. A little grass pokes up in patches, and the hostas with their legendary local reputation begin to curl open along unexpected corners of the foundation. I dug up my little patch. Made room for flox. And who, with a toddler, a dog, a cat, a deer convention in the neighborhood, and a fleet of Tonka trucks can expect to keep lettuce safe in the backyard?
But what I had not counted on was the wall. Around the base of our house, extending back behind the foundation of the main floor, is a stone wall. It stretches fifteen feet or so below the deck as the hillside drops off into anthills and, eventually, a creekbed. Then it jogs and stretches another fifteen feet or so along the back of the house. Above this stone wall and below the deck is a huge patch of scary-looking dirt. I assumed this dirt sat atop a stone foundation of the house. But, now cleared of soggy leaves and an old canoe, I have discovered the wall is simply that: a wall. It holds up a lot of really soft, squishy, deliciously chocolatey soil. Safely separated from the rest of the yard by a stretch of chicken wire, neither dog nor toddler can reach it. And, six feet off the ground, no deer will likely try.
So, today, with my onion starts and seed packets, I scaled a stepladder and dug trenches in freshly raked soil. My garden is just a teeny stretch about ten feet long and two feet wide. And I had to balance along atop crumbling stone wall to drop my seeds in their waiting furrows. But I will gladly clamber and wobble up there with my watering can and my spade if it means the possibility of tearing lettuce fresh from the earth into a salad bowl for my family.
There is something good about getting your hands in the earth. I have been planting seeds, separating perennials, rototilling, cleaning up the pine needles in the back alley and it all feels good. We organized a SPUUF (Stevens Point Unitarian Universalist Fellowship) project to plant the local national guard fence, topped off with barbed wire, (right across the street from the SPUUF building) with morning glories, peas and pole beans.
ReplyDeleteCarol and I have moved over a hundred perennials from her mom's yard (John and Iris recently sold their home) to our numerous gardens.
I repaired one of the irrigation lines that Billy accidently sliced in half last year while removing a shrub his mom no longer wanted. Glorious water really helps our sandy soil produce. Looking forward to a visit.
Spring is a time for garage sales in our little 450 person village. Next Sat. the entire village gets out their junk that "everyone wants to see". After the sale, a huge truck from the local St. Vincent's goodwill type operation picks up whatever didn't sell.
I have already sold $450 of prized(only by me) but no longer appreciated by my wife, stuff by giving friends preview sales opportunities. Sadly, (:-) I am now without a lawn mower (we still have 4), a 350# weight set, two bikes (we still have 8), a computer, (we still have 2 to sell), and a scanner. The good news is I now have some pocket money to buy stuff for the Shed (think of it as a grandpa Bill guest cottage) on Lake George.