So, you may have read this post about my mom's magical garden. Well, this fall, during a blissful visit to the farm, I mentioned to my mom that I would like to start my own garden...and could I possibly create it from bits and pieces of her garden? Absolutely, she beamed... 'cause that's just how my mom is! So she set to work digging and prying and lifting mounds of dirt surrounding precious roots and setting them in a bucket for me.
Yes, I am ashamed to say that she did the work. I just pranced around pointing and asking, What is that? Can I have some of that? And of course, I was working the camera! This was a moment that I wanted to capture and remember for years to come. I began by choosing those specimens that were most meaningful to me... the Siberian Rose that I remember my maternal grandmother always having in her garden so many years ago, another little ground-cover plant that lined the paths at my other grandma's house. I chose those that I always admired in my mom's garden. And then there were the pretty ones... irises, pansies, poppies, lilies.
Delicate shoots and roots were stacked with care in two big buckets for me to take home. I gathered an assortment of poppy heads full of seeds ready to carried away on the wind, but instead snapped up by me and transported to the city. Once home, I painstakingly transfered each and every precious piece into my own meager garden. It is small. It is ordinary. But the soil opened up and accepted the new foliage, which I took as a good sign. In fact, as the sun went down and I tamped down the soil around the last plant, I am sure that I heard welcoming whispers as the newbies were accepted.
I cannot be sure I will remember the names of those added to my garden. After living in the bucket for a few days (due to incessant rain) I could no longer recognize several of the plants. It doesn't matter though. Come Spring, I will get a big surprise... and I will have my very own magical garden.
