Fall, in Northern California, is planting time. After a dry summer come autumn and winter rains, we plant while the earth is warm and waiting for water.
My well-conceptualized ideal garden will have three zones:
- Right out the back door – a large stone patio with pots of things that smell amazing and can be used for cooking and sometimes sport bright pink flowers
- In the very close vicinity – a swimming pool, and maybe one border with gorgeous perennials to be poked at, encouraged, replaced in case of failure
- Everything else – an endless vista of oaks and gold hills, signs of humanity in the distance, maybe the sound of a truck rumbling on the road below
And yes I am describing an imaginary house in Napa, which also closely resembles my father’s actual place on the Peninsula, but never mind. I’m now trying to make it work for my suburban lot.
Pot of pink flowers, check. Fuchsia power.
In the distance, meaning, along my back yard fence, grows a tall oak underplanted with native Ribes. They’ll leaf out when the rains start. For now I’ll just use this dramatic filter to make them look intentionally ratty. Because they are. I like a little decay.
I struggle with the middle zone. As I’ve told you, our big elm fell, turning what had been a pretty woodland garden into a space custom-designed for herbaceous shrub torture.
Trying to keep hydrangeas alive until new shade can be planted is not pretty.
But as it turns out, gardens will thwart the best well-conceptualized plans. Middle zones have minds of their own. I had planted a passiflora in my sideyard; it bloomed amidst milkweed spotted with aphid remains.
More wonderfully, it grew next to a Naked Lily someone long before my time had planted. First bloom in 30+ years. Passion flowers and Naked Ladies, adjacent, lending each other what, mystery? Gravitas? Different for everyone I suppose.
Which is to say, gardens teach some people about cycles, some about working less hard, me about the happy limits of my intelligence.
Have a wonderful weekend.
18 Responses
I had read Janet’s beautiful gardening post, and find it relieving. I like to leave things as they are. Are you considering a pool for this house? I love ours, and find swimming laps my favorite form of exercise – so relaxing and meditative.
@KSL, It was a beautiful post. I have considered it, but then I’d need to build a shade trellis, as we’d have no room for a tree, so for now, I’m going to plant a tree and see how I feel. But I can imagine the joys of having one.
I love seeing leaves on the ground. (Not an excuse.) It’s reminiscent of places I hike. They don’t rake at the county parks.
I love the proximity of the naked lady and the passion flower!
@Cathy, My new motto – they don’t rake at the county parks.
My little bungalow in San Diego was built in 1952. When I bought it almost 3 years ago, I was pleasantly surprised to find hundreds of naked ladies! We had these in my childhood home (born in 1955) and I hated them then but now, they feel comforting and like home. The house came with framed original construction plans as a “custom” home for Mr. and Mrs. Herbert Simmer, and I like to think these are the descendants of the bulbs Mrs. Simmer planted as a young woman, thrilled with her new home. I have elderly citrus trees that have ragged stone rings around them that remind me of my childhood as well. I love your description of “in the distance” being along your back fence!!!
@MarlaD, The distance is a construct;). I love your story, my house was built in 1953. I wonder who the original owners were – I have never found a relic of any sort.
So cooled that somehow that passiflora coaxed that lily into showing up again after its long underground life — this is what I love about gardens, I think, is that they humour our efforts at control, welcome our aid, but then remind us that we’re not really in charge. So important to make room for serendipity, as you have. . . embrace it when it arrives. . .
@Frances, They do just that, humor us, and sometimes I think I can hear mine talking to me. So I talk back:).
I am not a gardener but admire those who are.
I cannot help but think of all the analogies a garden has to life. Reality verses fantasy, acceptance, imperfection and certainly life and death which can happen in a single season.
Thank-you as always.
Luci
@Luci, Gardens are almost annoying in the degree to which they generate metaphors for life;). And thank you! as always:).
I am not much of a gardener. After two and a half years in rentals, I am finally in my own house. In my last house, all choices were governed by the tastes of the deer that over-ran the neighborhood. No deer here, so I can think about having hydrangeas again, and there are hostas here. I love hostas but could not have them before.
I love your writing, Lisa. I can’t wait to read your book.
@Marie, Thank you so much for the kind words about my writing. I’m glad to hear you are in a house of your own, it must feel better, if not yet al the way to good.
BTW, I am only the kind of gardener who has a yard with plants and doesn’t want to pay for lots of maintenance and design help;). Mother, necessity, etc.
I have recently discovered the joy of walking into a garden of milkweed to find little monarch caterpillars, big ones, butterflies dancing around and laying yet more eggs. If your shade is gone, you might consider planning some of those sun-loving plants. They are the only thing that monarchs can feed on, if you plant it they will come, and watching it happen is such a joy.
@Christy, That’s milkweed you see surrounding the passiflora and the naked lady! Sadly, in the past two years I have had only one monarch visit, ever. Maybe I’m out of the path? Maybe the milkweed, in my side yard as it is, is too hard for monarchs to flap their way into? In any case, I’m keeping it for next year in hopes.
I love this post, The idea that life and beauty can wait, holding steady, until conditions change, and then awaken with opportunity. So many lessons here for us as we work in the garden. I actually love that bit of decay in the garden, that sense of having given its all and now being ready or rest. I probably need to learn more from that.
@Mardel, Thank you. Maybe I should learn from the fallen leaves, the browning ribes, too.
I would LOVE a pool!
Like Kathy I enjoy swimming laps and I enjoy that luxury at our cottage but not at home…
gardening teaches us so much about ourselves…
I am always surprised by Nature and how it humbles me.
Your patio area with the fallen leaves looks like a wonderful spot to sit back and soak in the serenity of your garden.
@Leslie Anne Lord, I was thinking, just the other day, that I ought to out a chair out there by the oak. The patio outside our back door gets too hot now, but that one by the fence, even on the hottest days, has some shade.
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