“How typical of Jean,” I thought when she sent me cheery photos (including the one above) of spring flowers in Vancouver. “To do something nice for me when it’s her birth-week.”
Jean does this kind of thing.
But it’s Jean’s birthday, so these flowers are dedicated to her.
If asked to name something that comes to mind when we think of Jean, her friends would probably say:
Family.
Faith.
Friendship.
Good Food.
Flowers.
(We might also add Athletics, Books and Music but those words don’t begin with an ‘F’, so they don’t make the cut here.)
These flowers are in honour of a special birthday.
Jean loves flowers. She’s actually studied gardening. Recently, she created a whole new garden from scratch.
Peonies are among her favorites.
So are Bleeding Hearts. These below are grandchildren of a plant she gave me years ago.
4 Photos above by Hamlin Grange
A few of Jean’s gardener friends have contributed flowers and garden scenes to this birthday greeting.
Ornamental grasses from Linda’s garden:
And a lovely white peony:
Jan sends this yellow beauty and the pink lady’s slippers by the lakeside:
And from Val’s garden come these peonies and scene of the lush countryside northwest of Toronto:
Our human friends like to hang out there and share their stories.
Dog friends like to sleep there and sometimes snore.
In the autumn, potted plants move in from the verandah.
English ivy sits on the window sill, Scotch Bonnet pepper sits on the floor.
Within a couple weeks, we’ll get dozens of ripe peppers….
… which we’ll give to relatives and friends. (I’m not a hot-pepper person, despite my Caribbean origins.)
Some days the whole kitchen smells of apples, cinnamon and other ingredients for pies….
…which DO include a tip of Jamaican rum, yes, and maple syrup too, since we’re a Jamaican-Canadian family.
Earlier, it was the fragrance of apple and mint jellies –
And as you can see, they’re still on the kitchen table — recent events having overtaken us…
Some days, the kitchen smells of herbs drying on a tray. Parsley, basil, rosemary and thyme.
And onions and garlic, fresh from the garden….
You’d think the kitchen is the only room in our old house.
It’s a wonder we don’t sleep there as well…
HAPPY HARVEST, EVERYONE (except for friends in S. Africa, New Zealand and Australia…. who for some strange reason are now planting their gardens and welcoming the springtime).
A pain-filled fall and winter got worse as we headed toward spring: the few times I went out, I caught something.
Flu.
Bronchitis.
A cough that wouldn’t end.
Photo by Hamlin Grange
Worn out and afraid of falling, I rarely even went into the garden.
Stuck in bed, I tried to write my way back to sanity and health.
Spring came.
And then.
“You’ve relapsed,” the specialist said flatly during my hospital visit.
“Guilty,” I replied. “Sorry.”
“Do NOT feel guilty,” she answered. “It was an awful winter. All my patients with complex injuries had a very tough time.”
“But your immune system is also weak,” she warned. “Be very careful this spring.”
I listened.
I promised.
And I was.And then.
It was gardening season.
Day after day, my husband worked hard in the garden.
I watched, feeling entirely useless.
He left, on an errand.
And then.
I spied a large crop of forget-me-not growing into the lawn from the garden beds. I know they bug him, and I know they’re easy to dig with a trowel. And so I thought I’d help.
A small thing.
A good thing.
I could do this. I crouched over the lawn and started digging, feeling useful. When the back and leg pain intensified, I lay on my front, face just above the grass.
I dug, sneezing as dust went into my nose.
Then I spied a few dandelions nearby. Now I crouched over them, trowel engaged.
“Stop!” said my wiser self.
I listened.
I meant to.
In just a few seconds.
And then.
My sense of time did not kick in. It rarely does.
When I got up, the pain almost knocked me out. I staggered. Stumbled. Fought against falling, my cane desperately trying to find purchase in the ground.
“Cynthia! Cynthia!” came the panicked shout.
I had not heard my husband return.
I ask you: which is worse?
To watch your partner struggle to do the gardening duties that you loved doing — on top of everything else on his plate? Or risk even worse pain — and his distress — by doing a few small gardening things to help? Some days, I’m almost used to the pain. It’s with me all the bloody time.
But the guilt? I never get used to the guilt of watching him do all the gardening work. It drives me nuts.
“Why do you do this?” He shook his head, frustrated and angry. “You know better!”
Yes I do.
So I’m obeying the doctor. Again.
Sparing my husband distress. Again.
Trying to cope with guilt. Again.
All stuff that requires a person to be not just smart, but wise.
So far, so good.
Wish me luck.
**
Dedicated to all gardeners who are struggling due to age, illness or pain. And to the caring people who help us: thank you.
It is a truth universally suspected that a family in possession of a wildlife painting must be in need of some wildlife.
**
Years ago, my husband’s family had a farm and he and I became custodians of it. The farm was on a hilltop so we cleverly named it Hill Top.
Husband, children and I summered and weekend-ed there. I loved that farm and wanted a name sign for our front gate. So my husband commissioned a local artist to make one for my birthday. Author-illustrator Beatrix Potter – she of Peter Rabbit fame and a farmhouse named Hill Top — came to mind.
The moment that sign went up, Peter Rabbit, his parents and all their friends took up residence in our gardens.
They ate us out of home and land. As soon as we planted vegetables, herbs and flowers, they ate them. There was soya and wheat growing in the fields. But why travel so far, when there’s good stuff nearby?
My husband couldn’t bring himself to hurt them — not with that sign out front. So there we were, hoist on our own petard.
When our family moved to another home, there were no rabbits — we thought.
And then two auspicious things happened:
We visited the old farmhouse. Our daughter noticed that the new owners had removed the Hill Top sign and begged them to give it back. They graciously agreed.
Soon after, our resident red fox – a predator of rabbits — upped and died. It might have been the sight of the sign that did it. But there was his carcass, lying across our stream.
It took gallons of expensive fox urine to protect our gardens that year. (If you want to learn more about that inauspicious episode, you’ll have to read my next book.)
And now?
Years after moving to our current farmhouse, we’re besieged by wild rabbits — again. Squirrels too, but they don’t eat shrubs, herbs, flowers and vegetables.
Last winter, the rabbits were so starved for food that they ate all my clematis vines, plus the barks of several tender young trees and shrubs.
My husband did a very manly thing: he shouted at them. The rabbits ran — and immediately returned.
We decided to sympathize. Wild rabbits, too, have to eat.
But soon it was spring — time to plant vegetables.
Husband decided the rabbits should be moved to a nearby nature park. He set a humane trap filled with things that Beatrix Potter said wild rabbits love: carrots and lettuce and cabbages. But we might as well have posted a sign saying: “This is a rabbit trap.”
Truth is, these particular rabbits mostly eat grass and clover so far this spring.
Truth is, our daughter has named them Fred and Penelope. (At least, she thinks there are only two. But where there are two, there are — or soon will be — a dozen.)
And truth is, my husband has put the sign up again.
“How typical of Jean,” I thought when she sent me cheery photos (including the one above) of spring flowers in Vancouver. “To do something nice for me when it’s her birth-week.”
Jean loves flowers. She’s actually studied gardening. Recently, she created a whole new garden from scratch.
