the ghost of gardens yet to come
For the last several years, ordering seeds has been one of my New Year's Day rituals. The catalogs arrive in December, bright spots scattered throughout the month, and I save them up and go through them on the first morning of January, getting excited about dozens of varieties -- my gesture of faith in the coming summer. In the afternoon, I go through my notes about what plants did and didn't work last year; I check my stores of saved and held-over seed to see what I need to replace; I make lists. And then I channel my exuberance into a select few new types of tomato, bean, squash, herbs. This is the garden at its most beautiful, all hope and wishful thinking: This year I will start the peppers and eggplants earlier, mulch the beans, thin the carrots, build that raspberry trellis at last. No rabbits yet, no weeds.
This winter, because I'll be elsewhere on New Year's Day, I've settled in early: on the couch with a lapful of cats, catalogs and pen and a pot of tea on the table next to me, ready to be charmed by all the new offerings and reminded of the varieties I've been meaning to try for years.
Outside, it's bare trees and bright light casting sharp shadows on the brilliant snow, the strange lunar landscape of wind-driven powder over scoured ice: near-bare ground in some places, high drifts in others. The sleeping soil dreams of seeds. Inside, it's color photos of possibility and promise, steam from the tea at my elbow, the vision and anticipated joy of the work ahead.
Originally posted at Dreamwidth || Read
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This winter, because I'll be elsewhere on New Year's Day, I've settled in early: on the couch with a lapful of cats, catalogs and pen and a pot of tea on the table next to me, ready to be charmed by all the new offerings and reminded of the varieties I've been meaning to try for years.
Outside, it's bare trees and bright light casting sharp shadows on the brilliant snow, the strange lunar landscape of wind-driven powder over scoured ice: near-bare ground in some places, high drifts in others. The sleeping soil dreams of seeds. Inside, it's color photos of possibility and promise, steam from the tea at my elbow, the vision and anticipated joy of the work ahead.
Originally posted at Dreamwidth || Read
comments on Dreamwidth