Few things have ever passed me by without some
opportunity for successful achievement. Gardening just hasn't been one of
them.
In 1954 I was first born to a middle income western
Pennsylvania town dwelling young couple. My mom did all the family
gardening in all the years I’ve known her.
I married my high school sweetheart who had grown up
and educated in a family business called Pottenger Nursery and Landscape
Company. Ever hear the story about the cobbler’s children? Apply the
same analogy for the landscaper's wife.
Our home properties have always been neat, tidy, and
well trimmed. Not much flourish, flowers or ornamental details.
In 2005 I was diagnosed with breast cancer and my
husband and granddaughter built me a container garden on my back deck. At
the time we lived in heavily forested ground and every attempt to plant
anything was just a massive failure. My deck was raised up a good two
stories off the ground. All I had to do was get the squirrels gone. We
planted pure indulgence on that deck container garden. I puttered about as
expected and developed addictions t' lavender, rosemary and arugala
lettuce.
In 2006 my reward for surviving 2005 was a move to a
five acre hilltop property with a mix of open space (uptop-outback), two
stocked fish ponds, at least three acres of dense forest and of course the
‘boggy bottom’. We named our new to us home ‘Chickadee Hill. Not far
from Gnaw Bone, can't miss it if you look really hard and drive slowly.
Our first spring on Chickadee Hill was mostly awestruck
wonderment. We found seven large professionally landscaped but very
overgrown and untended garden spots. That year we allowed everything to
grow as it had in past few years. I really just wanted to see what was
there and what wasn’t supposed to be somewhere else.
One day I called my mom and told her that for the first
time in my 52 yrs of life, my house was filled with fresh flowers that I had
cut my very own self. I think that choked her up a little bit. For the
most part of that spring and summer I never had a day without flowers. I
even bought some new vases and everything!
I am surrounded by family and friends who are fully
trained and certified master gardeners. One by one I invited them to
visit. Out of the bunch of them I heard the following comments:
"Oh my!", "Hmmmmm!" ; "Lotta work!"; "That’s a weed. Dig it
out."; "That’s a flower. Don't dig that out"; "You’ve got
moles. Get a cat";' "That’s a snake skin. Get a Cat;"; And interestingly there were several exclamations in
various forms of the phrase "Wholey Poop what a mess!!"
The most important observation?
"That’s a rat. Get a cat.", I did.
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