The Kindness of Gardeners

This neighborhood is one for the ages. Bay windows jut out into enormous oak trees. Turrets rise on every corner. And, if you stand on your front porch, and you look down the block, you see porches until they disappear at the vanishing point.

I think this neighborhood must attract people who relish fresh air, and sunlight, and downright neighborliness.

The days I get to stay all day in this place are magic, and rare. Most days I leave his place, on the bike, chug five to ten miles away. But some days I am here, all day, and wonder why I ever bother to leave.

Today I labored for a favorite client. She is discerning. Particular. Hard to deal with, some might say. No, she is not. She knows what she loves and is impatient until she gets it. I respect that.

We started with crabgrass and a chain link fence, and overgrown, truculent hollies. I built her a cedar fence, wisteria arbor, paths, a trellis. I went on quixotic quests for white camellias she wanted me to espalier: pink or blush or anything more common just would not do. I separated my shoulder hoisting her cryptomeria, or Japanese temple cedar, over the wrought iron fence: the hazards of a one man show.

Today I hack away at an ancient pyracantha, or firethorn, a wicked shrub of menacing spikes. Its root mass was a tangle, dense, hard as a rock, at least 75 years old if not a hundred. It's time had come. A soft, ice blue, feathery cypress will replace it. The menacing barberry met a similar fate. For her, it is all about the texture.

For the limited time I spend in my own neighborhood, I marvel at how many people know me by name. But it is that kind of place. We all walk to the shops, and see each other at the Farmers Market, the brewery, the theatre that mounts shows in Calvary Church.

Today as I labored, it was a cavalcade. Of neighbors, and passersby. Everyone wanted to make sure on this sweltering day I was hydrated. I assured them a little sweat never hurt anyone, and was the body's efficient cooling system.

I still don't know how everyone knew. I have mentioned it but to a few. But one after another, they approached, wishing me well.

A neighbor I know by face, but not name, with whom I last conversed six years ago, brought me a tiny pot. A little seedling of Baptisia australis, or false indigo. She remembered from those many years ago that it was my favorite plant.

And as the day went on, the offerings continued: Assorted hostas. Hens and chicks. Rhubarb. Crocosima. And, I kid you not, a seven-foot tall, red-and-white dappled, All-American, Fourth of July rose bush.

It is as if they wanted me to take a piece of this place with me.

I am humbled.

Someone remembered how much I love old stones, and brought me a Philadelphia antique curbstone.

Someone else brought me a rusty old horseshoe, the kind we are always finding when we dig around here.

I somehow ended up with a seven foot section of wrought iron fencing as well.

The kindness of gardeners.

I don't know what the future holds, or for sure where I am living, or how I will earn my keep.

But all I know is when I depart this place next week, bound for the craggy sandstone cliffs above the Cuyahoga's deepest gorge, my U-haul will be packed with some rather unusual items.

Not the least among them, a gaudy, glorious, seven-foot tall Fourth of July rose. I'll shower the Turnpike, from one end to the next, with it's garish, jubilant, glorious petals.