Plantings

You must understand that we were complete novices at gardening: neither of us had done much beyond weeding, at home. For nearly a decade, we’d lived, separately or together, in apartments, in a palace, and in the homes of others, but never yet in our house with our garden. We pored over the Burpee catalog and read books on hydroponics, mulching, and the culture of healthful vegetables.

Once Spring arrived, I dug up a rectangle along the west side of our property (our property!!), moved vast quantities of uncooperative Middlesex County stone, mulched with plastic, and planted some crops. Also built raised beds up against the house, on the edge of the driveway. The flower in the gap between them may have been a rose. Or maybe not. If my photographic skills weren’t so rudimentary, we might be able to identify them.

Apart from some spring pansies and daffodils, I recognize unambiguously only the allium giganteum (spherical purple flower-cluster) that grew from Burpee’s bulb. Again, better focus would have helped.

After we sold the place and then returned some time later to see how it was holding up without us, I was bummed to observe that our successors had seen fit to tear out the fruit of all my toil. Valerie was more philosophical, but then she usually is.