1) I always said if I didn’t have Reunions taking up all my time in May I’d spend more time in the garden. Well, the registration deadline for Reunions was traditionally this Wednesday, and I don’t have to care about it. In fact, this is the first May since 1996 that I am not stressed out about some sort of event. No Reunions, no opening night or end-of-season parties, no non-profit fund-raisers. I’m still adjusting to this New Normal.
2) So for the second time this month, I stepped into the garden this morning to weed and to plant a packet of lavender seeds. Mother is the only person I’ve ever met who enjoyed weeding, so it’s rather a fitting tribute to her to undertake this the day after Mother’s Day.
3) Once you accept that weeding is an infinite task - there will always be weeds, no matter how industrious a gardener might be - it becomes easier. And in this garden, there will certainly always be weeds, especially Norway maple seedlings. Today I concentrated on a sunny spot next to the house, by my HVAC unit and behind the star magnolia. Because there were so many Unwanted Plants just starting to come up, it made it much easier to identify and uproot them now than it would have been even next month. Then they would have looked too large to vanquish. There were a few things growing immediately next to the foundation, and I really had to maneuver with my trowel, but I defeated them! After finding a particularly soft spot of earth, though, I backed off from that area. I didn’t want to find out the hard way that something might be burrowing down there.
Could this be the mythical black tulip? Hah!
4) After all that I did take a quick survey of the whole garden and weed out more seedlings in the far corner. Some survivors of the pre-2003 landscape bring me joy: the bleeding hearts, the one purple-black tulip, dozens and dozens of little violets. There are dandelions, of which I am more tolerant than I used to be. The Bee-Keeping Neighbors, who moved a couple years ago, caused me to learn that dandelions are good bee habitat, and we must be kind to the bees at this point.
5) Soon my long-ago additions to the garden, the white peonies and pink lily-of-the-valley, will start to bloom. The latter, begun with the gift of half a dozen from my friend Olive back in 2005 or 2006, have spread to cover maybe ten square feet. I love them!
6) The test now is, will I return to the garden tomorrow, next week, or next month?
The tulips my new neighbor planted last fall still bloom beautifully.