Saturday, May 01, 2004
The garden outside my home office window isn't much to look at if you're into groomed and clipped. For that you would have had to visit this garden about fifteen years ago when the previous owners, the XXX's lived here. I'm sure back then it was lovely -- in a manicured-sort-of-way. Rocks which once bordered neatly-contained, weed-free flower beds are still visible. A slate stone path is barely visible on the lawn although it is menacingly threatened by encroaching grass intent on smothering its existence. If, by the way, I were so inspired to save the slated path by hacking the grass back into conformity, it would still lead to nowhere but the back fence. So I'm not quite sure what the point of such an energy-expenditure would be. The lawn has become arguably patchy in places. In those patches have grown what most gardeners would consider 'enemy combatants' (i.e. crab grass and dandelions); they have grown from sect status to a considerable demographic to be reckoned with.
Certainly the young man who comes to cut the grass thinks my garden worthy of disdain: "What a mess," he pronounced this morning.
As usual I don't see it this way at all. A perfectly manicured garden, in my opinion, is just boring. Worse, it is horribly irresponsible from an environmental standpoint. Because let's think about how one achieves such manicure-dom. Either the curators of the garden are using massive amounts of toxic chemicals to realize their aesthetic weed-free whims or they have a lot of cheap, illegal labor mulching the flower beds. In either case, copious amounts of precious fresh water are needed to water these stamps'-of perfect-suburban-green.
An untamed garden is much more interesting in my opinion. It is a joy to watch evolution unfold before one's eyes as competing plants vie for sunlight, water, and turf. Over time one discovers that these plants usually find a way to co-exist happily and the result is a colorful oxymora of harmonic cacophony. My contribution to this untamed chaotic beauty outside my window is the clay pot(s) that dot my cement patio. They are filled with rich black earth and a purpose: either an herb, vegetable, or riot of color. The 'garden' itself is but a symbiotic backdrop to my man-made potted dallying.
This leads me to my insurgent squirrels. Last week I put out pots of pansies and tulips in my as-yet vain attempt to encourage this stubborn Spring into labor. The dogwood tree outside my window, for instance, still stands brown-barren naked. However, no sooner had I bedecked our outdoor picnic table with a pot full of motivational encouragement, when a small group of militant squirrels attacked-and-destroyed my planted jewelry. I mean destroyed it. They savagely dug out the tulip bulbs and severed every pansy head blooming so prettily.
My theory is that the backyard squirrels have been so traumatized over the years by my Australian Shepard (who for lack of sheep to herd has made it her mission to try and rid the world of evil squirrels every time she runs out into the garden) that the squirrels have made it their mission to retaliate both viciously and unrelentingly against their aggressor. To think my garden is a microcosm of the bigger world...
Certainly the young man who comes to cut the grass thinks my garden worthy of disdain: "What a mess," he pronounced this morning.
As usual I don't see it this way at all. A perfectly manicured garden, in my opinion, is just boring. Worse, it is horribly irresponsible from an environmental standpoint. Because let's think about how one achieves such manicure-dom. Either the curators of the garden are using massive amounts of toxic chemicals to realize their aesthetic weed-free whims or they have a lot of cheap, illegal labor mulching the flower beds. In either case, copious amounts of precious fresh water are needed to water these stamps'-of perfect-suburban-green.
An untamed garden is much more interesting in my opinion. It is a joy to watch evolution unfold before one's eyes as competing plants vie for sunlight, water, and turf. Over time one discovers that these plants usually find a way to co-exist happily and the result is a colorful oxymora of harmonic cacophony. My contribution to this untamed chaotic beauty outside my window is the clay pot(s) that dot my cement patio. They are filled with rich black earth and a purpose: either an herb, vegetable, or riot of color. The 'garden' itself is but a symbiotic backdrop to my man-made potted dallying.
This leads me to my insurgent squirrels. Last week I put out pots of pansies and tulips in my as-yet vain attempt to encourage this stubborn Spring into labor. The dogwood tree outside my window, for instance, still stands brown-barren naked. However, no sooner had I bedecked our outdoor picnic table with a pot full of motivational encouragement, when a small group of militant squirrels attacked-and-destroyed my planted jewelry. I mean destroyed it. They savagely dug out the tulip bulbs and severed every pansy head blooming so prettily.
My theory is that the backyard squirrels have been so traumatized over the years by my Australian Shepard (who for lack of sheep to herd has made it her mission to try and rid the world of evil squirrels every time she runs out into the garden) that the squirrels have made it their mission to retaliate both viciously and unrelentingly against their aggressor. To think my garden is a microcosm of the bigger world...
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