It's with a lot of joy I am starting to write this post. I feel I have been waiting for this all winter. Even if I really like the cold it felt it was never ending and I was starting to be so tired of it.
Spring is definitely here and has shown its first colors with crocus, daffodils, trees in bloom, I am already thinking of the delicious fruits we might harvest in the summer.
I contemplate my garden and I imagine all the things we want to do. Every year is different and we learn so much from every season. The shape of the garden is different, the trees, plants are bigger or didn't make through winter.
We already had our first greens for a fresh salad, I have some starts inside waiting to be big enough to be outside, a lot of basil, I guess when I planted the seeds I was thinking of pesto so much!
It's late the windows are opened and I can smell the strong enchanting perfume of our lilac.
What about your garden ?
Happy spring !
The real kick of humility stems from the sheer nature of city life. That is to say, most people don’t come to the city to live off of the land. We are likely to be renting houses or apartments, where the owner may or may not allow us to do our own gardening. We have non-garden-, non-farm-related jobs. In my case, that job takes me to faraway places for weeks. It’s a privilege that anyone who grows food for their livelihood cannot afford. We possess no delusions of self-sufficiency, nor even of a steady stream of supplementary food.
Which brings me to the point: that knock-down, humbling experience of growing (or trying to grow) things in an urban setting frequently gives way to gratitude. Gratitude for what does grow, for the surprise successes and the feeling of putting it on the table. And, moreover, immense gratitude for what others tend and provide. I’ve been going to farmers’ markets for years in rural, rolling-green-hills Virginia, without giving them too much thought. Now that I live in a city, they seem nothing short of miraculous. I mean, farmers’ markets! How brilliant are those places? People grow beautiful food, bring it to your city, and sell it at affordable prices in pleasant open-air markets. Gardening in city circumstances has made me celebrate their harvests to a degree I never did before.
This week, I’m cultivating gratefulness for some party-dress-ruffled collards my garden is putting out. It’s technically past the time for these collards to be harvested, but they had a strange year. I planted them in a spot with too much shade, so they grew too little early in the season. Then I had problems with pests. And only finally, when I had all but given up on them, they straightened their shoulders and turned into vibrant, unexpected grey-green beauties. I’ve been appreciating them in the mornings, tossed simply in oil and wilted, on a garlic-rubbed piece of toast.
Consider: Modern cities, in general, were often conceived with the plan to keep flourishing green things at bay as best as possible. Washington, DC, where I live, was built on top of a swamp that was drained to the best of Jeffersonian-era abilities. Beautiful species of water flora were virtually eradicated, tidal marshes were filled in, and we logged the heck outta this little space. And now, years later, in some bizarre circle of history, home and community gardeners are trying to reclaim those green spaces, ushering in food and flower where they can.