LIFE'S LITTLE SIDE TRIPS

Here I am, all settled into my routine of summer garden job in the north and winter vacation in the south, always the same places, and very content with this arrangement. Along comes a daughter telling me she's quitting her corporate job, buying a motorhome, and she and I will travel the southwest U.S. for six months.

OMG, panic in the streets of my mind! What, get me out of my comfy little rut, and make me think again? How Dare You. Now I have to learn how to winterize my trailer, something I've never done before. Now I have to find a keeper for my truck for the winter. Now I have to make lists of what to bring on this new adventure.

Remembering that the difference between a rut and a grave is that one can still climb out of a rut, I'm loving every minute of this! New Adventure is the name of the game, and this is my opportunity to join forces with this daughter in new ways, as we not only explore the great outdoors of the southwest, but also the great "indoors" of our inner truths. We're not a religious lot, but we are spiritual seekers.

Life's little side trips add such richness to the equation; the unexpected can be so delightful; each little trip gives us the opportunity to say YES! to adventure. Look out World, here we come (beginning mid-September)!

DOING THINGS THE OLD WAY

No rain in sight . . . gardens are thirsty! I fondly remember the early spring days when we had frequent gentle ground-soaking rains, and I never had to water. I had time to finish up garden prep, and do all the needed planting. Now, as I drag my watering hose from spigot to spigot, I think an irrigation system would be wonderful.

Oh, wait --- is that what I really want? With my hose, I get to seriously visit each section of the garden as I water. I get to see who needs deadheading, and who has weeds that are pretending to be flowers (and I pull them as I see them). I get to notice all the new little buds that promise continued blooming. I get to be surprised at the first hibiscus bloom, and can imagine what our "hibiscus hill" will look like when all seven plants are in bloom and look forward to getting pictures of that! Our first giant sunflower just opened fully, what a delight, and there are buds there too. I get to notice what garden insects are active, and I get to capture that darn japanese beetle who thought he was hiding in the rose.

When I water I see so much detail that I might miss if all I do is walk through the garden. This way, I'm standing in front of one section at a time. It's the difference between driving through a neighborhood and walking through a neighborhood. When you walk, you have the time to wave at people, and stop for a friendly chat.

OK so I don't want an irrigation system after all.

PICTURES, AS PROMISED

Our newest garden area: a former grassy field has been transformed by a gazebo surrounded by small gardens and pathways. Less grass to cut and surely easy on the eyes!

This first picture taken in April is of the "naked" garden areas, ready for planting. . .

This was my first-ever experience at doing it all, from laying the bricks and gravel paths, to planning then digging the gardens, hauling lots of compost to amend the soil, to setting the borders, to doing the actual planting. There's color for every part of the growing season! The rest of the pictures were taken a few days ago; all planting is done for this year and there's room for more next year.

Of course we're not finished: there are more areas to be transformed. Saving that for another time; Rome wasn't built in a day, right?

Campers want to know what the plants are, so I've placed labels for the more unusual things we have growing. This sparks so many nice conversations with our visitors!

They're surprised to see we have herbs scattered among the flowers. . .

And these final few pictures are of some very happy faces!

FINALLY, MIDSUMMER!

I've been working toward this since March: the time when our summer perennials begin their blooming! I see buds everywhere: blackeyed susans, coneflowers, mexican hyssop; daisies have opened, the zinnias are too. The hollyhocks are in full bloom. Our ten hardy hibiscus bushes are even sending up buds, with promise of another spectacular show -- one of my favorites! The roses continue their blooming, they must like the food I give them.

Best news of all (knock on wood) we haven't been overrun by japanese beetles. We decided to NOT put out the beetle traps this year; instead we vigilantly search for them (very few so far) and get rid of them one by one, via smashing or capturing in a baggie.

This is not to say all's been planted that will be planted. On this little piece of our planet, the campground owners continually come home from a shopping trip with "oh look what we found!" And they bring forth more perennials: several russian sage, and shrub roses that will grow to a width of ten feet, and a few other things. Here's my challenge, the one I love the best: where the heck do I put these things?? The two russian sage plants when fully grown will be about 4' tall and 3' wide -- each. Heck, there's just NO ROOM in the existing gardens! And the shrub roses? Who knows?

After studying different areas, I caved in and simply built a whole new little garden area for the russian sage. This will be a specimen garden, unlike the other gardens that dance with a wonderful mixture of flowering beauties of all colors, shapes, and sizes. As for the shrub roses: we just happen to have an appropriate area along one of our pathways that will accommodate a 10' wide shrub.

OK: I promise to take pictures this week!

WHAT THE HECK?!?

This morning I was up early, wanted to get to work before it got too hot outdoors; worked til lunchtime; had lunch, took a nap, went back to work later in the day. So far, so good.

I crawled into bed at 10pm tonight, with plans to repeat today's schedule. Then it happened: I lay there, sleepily musing about some good stuff in my life. One thought led to another, and yet another, things/people/events I'm so darn grateful for. I kept saying, in between these thoughts, "time to sleep now, let the healing begin" (I consider the dark sacred night a healing time while I sleep) but the thoughts continued. At 11 pm I got up, had a glass of milk, went back to bed.

At midnight I was up again. Still wide awake. Turned on my computer, did some surfing, and now it's 1:30 am, it's tomorrow, for goodness' sake! What the heck?!?

Oh, no --- can it be that FINALLY I've had enough sleep? Am I reaching the time in my life like my grandmother's, when she said she only needed four or five hours of sleep a night?? Please no, I really like sleep!

Panda, my little dog friend, dutifully followed me from the bed to the couch. She looks at me and wonders what's up. Is it morning already? It's still dark outside! I think this gratitude thing is backfiring on me, I might need to turn it down a notch? Nah, I think not. I'll just sign off here and work on my to-do list for today when the sun shines. If I'm awake then.

OOPS --- HOW TIME FLEW

MY BAD! For the past three weeks or so I got so caught up in planting, I didn't even think about blogging. One of my 'keepers' reminded me how behind I am. Time to catch up.

All the zillion plants we bought are now in the ground or in container gardens or in hanging baskets. All are doing very well -- I think because of the rain we've had. Rainwater is SO much better, the plants tell me.

Couldn't rest on my laurels, though. The owner reminded me that in his greenhouse he has a truckload of flats, all seedlings he planted earlier, and they're ready to go. Zinnias, Giant Sunflowers (the 8' tall kind), Mexican Sunflowers, Cosmos, Daisies, Marigolds, and a number of things that are no longer labeled (labels blew away). I finally got all that stuff planted this week. The unlabeled ones were fun to plant, and it will be fun to watch them grow, and fun to discover what they are, and fun to see if I planted them in the right place! I'm hoping they want a full-sun home, because that's where I put them.

Good spring rains is a two-edged sword: the plants love it and thrive, and so do the WEEDS. Much of my time has involved weed control, as in pulling them. It's not that I love pulling weeds, it's that I love the end result; but it's like housework, it's never finished. That's OK because I guess I like being on my hands and knees --- I have the callouses to prove it. My one weeding knee (the one I'm always using to kneel on) has a marvelous callous, also known as body armor.

Even though our perennials aren't in full bloom yet, the campers here are already raving about the beauty of the gardens. They ARE lush with greenery, and the annuals we've put in give the needed color, and we have an incredible variety of plants (see the April 4th post for a list). I tell the campers, please come back in midsummer and you'll see a REAL show!

What's next on my to-do list? A bit of tree-trimming: got to raise the canopies to get more sun onto some of the gardens. I wait for the gas-powered pole saw to be fixed, because I'm so ready to trim!

FINALLY, TIME TO PLANT

Two days ago the bosses and I went plant shopping -- a good four hours of finding annuals and perennials for our extensive gardens. We hit two large nurseries in the process, and came home with a trailer load of goodies. This annual event is like binge-shopping

While at the nurseries, I watched the employees tending the plants and I thought, 'what a great job to have'. Reality set in and I realized MY JOB is so much more fabulous: the nursery employees nurture a billion young plants, and that's so important; but I get to selectively adopt plants, bring them home, find the right spot for them to live and grow and bring pleasure to lots of people, tend to them for years on end (the perennials, anyway), keep the beasts at bay (especially those darn japanese beetles) and grow a long-term relationship with them

Yesterday I began the planting: I put together 24 container gardens then began putting plants in the ground. I'd envisioned working until nightfall because we have SO MANY to plant! But, no matter how willing the spirit, the flesh just wouldn't last that long, so I had to give it up for the day. Ah, that's OK: I also can't eat a half gallon of ice cream in one sitting, nor have I ever been able to eat an elephant in one bite. This means, beautifully, that for the next very many days I will be planting, and planting, and planting . . .

NEW AND DIFFERENT, EVERY YEAR

My first spring at this campground began on March 15, 2007. When I arrived from warm humid southwest Louisiana, it was COLD up here (Maryland) but I needed to get to work right away. There were a good three to four inches of leaves that obliterated all of the rock gardens, and those leaves needed to be removed. Because of all the plants and shrubs, it had to be done mostly by hand. As I worked (and it took a good three weeks) I noticed I was trampling on the new shoots under the leaves, of the season's first arrivals: the tulips and daffodils and crocuses and irises. I cringed every time I uncovered one of my victims! It all got done, though, and we had a great "crop" of flowers once the mountains of leaves were removed. It was a great and exciting first year at my new job of gardener/landscaper.

The following year I decided to wait until April 1st to arrive (I was remembering how cold it was the previous year and I was chicken). I arrived to find a young man had been hired to get the leaves out of the gardens, and he'd used a rake; had raked the gardens SO vigorously that some of the new young plants had been removed along with the leaves. Ah, well, life goes on, doesn't it. This particular spring was cold for a long, long time and it seemed forever before things poked their heads through the ground. Our planting season was slighty delayed due to the late-arriving spring, but the weather turned suddenly HOT and we really scurried to get new planting done quickly. Remembering how much time I'd spent watering during the last summer's drought, I laid soaker hoses in all the large gardens so that I could spend my time doing other things while the gardens were being watered. It worked well.

THIS year I returned in mid-March, wanting to be the one to do the garden cleanup. Yes, it was cold but I was being brave, and gardens were cleaned up without disturbing any plants. No trampling this year! However: the new experience is the rain! It's like living in a rain forest, I think. The ground has been thoroughly soaked down to about China. I have several new gardens in the works and I'm eager to build up the soil and get things planted in them, but the soil right now is like mud soup. No sooner does it begin to dry out and we get another four-hour deluge or all-day-and-night soaking steady rain. Temps have been cool, too -- good for tulips lasting a longer time than usual (until we had four days of freakish July weather which ended the tulip season), the nurseries have been slow in putting out their inventory due to the cool and wet, and we're behind schedule in creating our forty or so container gardens and almost as many hanging baskets. I'm just hoping for an extended spring so we can get all the work done before the really hot weather arrives for good.

Gee, I wonder what will be new and different NEXT spring!

P.S.

Thinking more about what I said yesterday: years ago, I was a bricks-and-sticks homeowner because I had a family to raise, and that was part of the deal. So perhaps there are others in that boat, taking care of business in the best way for them. You know, the home site, the stability factor, giving the kids good roots and good memories for later. The stability factor is a big one, I think.

I'm just glad I now have the freedom to be unstable. LOL.

DOING IT MY WAY

Yesterday a friend asked me if I ever get tired of living in a camper. Yeah, right! If he knew how I love housework (my idea of cleaning is to sweep the room with a glance), he'd know I never, ever want to go back to living in a real house!

A real house is for domesticated folks, folks who like having roots in one place, who dote on having lots of stuff to mess with. They probably enjoy dusting and sweeping and mopping. They must feel comforted by being surrounded by family heirlooms, or fine art. Many of them have serious collections of stuff that need to be displayed. There are lots of pictures on the walls, in every room. Of course they surely enjoy entertaining their friends.

Hey, you know I like all those things too. The only difference is, I'm not so domesticated; I'm at heart a feral animal. I like my roots to be nestled comfortably in different places at different times. I enjoy the heck out of cleaning THE GREAT OUTDOORS!! I love to dig up weeds, and rake leaves, and grow and tend to plants. Pressure washing is a really fun way to clean stuff. My family heirlooms and fine art are the trees and flowers, and the sounds of nature. My alarm clock is the birds in the morning, who seem so happy for the return of daylight. My pictures hang in my heart and on my computer. My collections of stuff are planted in the ground. The one thing I've never been good at is entertaining. I never learned how to host a party. I recently learned, however, that after five glasses of wine I am apparently very funny. I guess that's a form of entertaining.

Yep, I'm sure not regretting selling that house and all that stuff, because now I'm really free to live the way I want to live. It's all so good!