I'm an intemperate gardener. Some years I'm fastidious with weeding, fertilizing, pruning and deadheading. Other years I feed the plants and just allow them to grow however they will. The last couple of years, I've done the latter. I wasn't timely with separating and propagating plants so when the time came to divvy up the Hosta "Sagae", Pulmonaria "Roy Davidson," and my dwarf white Astilbe it was quite a job. They hadn't been divided in about 4 years and were huge clumps to contend with. So I took three clumps and ended up with 30 smaller ones. They're all planted now. I still have a clump of Pulmonaria "Mrs. Moon" and a peach Astilbe to divide...I shudder to think about tackling them--they're huge.
~*~
Almost everyone here calls today "Decoration Day" instead of "Memorial Day," because that's what a lot of them do--they go to the cemetery and leave flowers. Usually the local fire hall has some sort of lunch or homecoming thing set up for the out-of-towners and locals to get together and gossip or whatever they call it. I usually don't go to the cemetery today, even though it's just across the field from my place. I go later in the week when no one else is around and leave some fresh cuttings of whatever's blooming on my maternal grandparents' graves. I might have to buy cut flowers this year because aside from Spiderwort, not much else is in bloom.
An elderly couple from Ohio drove up to the house yesterday while I was in the yard. Bella, the shelter rescue wonder dog with separation anxiety issues went nuts barking; Fletcher climbed one of the maples. I was covered in filth from digging up and separating plants. They sat parked in the drive conferring for a few moments--I kept my back to them, replanting hosta. The
woman gets out of the car and says "This used to be the X homestead. My maiden name was X. Would it be okay if we walked around and took pictures--I have pictures from back when it was the X place." Actually, no; no it was not okay. This property no longer belonged to the Xs. It hadn't for at least 50 years.
They didn't say anything when I said, "no;" they just gave me a look indicating they thought I was rude and inhospitable and got in their big loud red truck and drove away. Although they were polite enough, I found the whole thing incredibly nervy and presumptuous. The property no longer belonged to a family member--whatever claim they thought they had to it was forfeited when it was sold.
Had I not been there working in the yard, I know they would have walked around and taken pictures to their hearts' contents--in short they would've reminisced and trespassed, commenting on how it all used to be, then gone to the fire hall for a nice lunch before driving back to Ohio, braking for anything even resembling a curve in the road.
When I told Brian about this today he offered to sit on the front porch in a wifebeater with a shotgun and bottle of bourbon, threatening any and all potential trespassers. Is that love or what?
An elderly couple from Ohio drove up to the house yesterday while I was in the yard. Bella, the shelter rescue wonder dog with separation anxiety issues went nuts barking; Fletcher climbed one of the maples. I was covered in filth from digging up and separating plants. They sat parked in the drive conferring for a few moments--I kept my back to them, replanting hosta. The
woman gets out of the car and says "This used to be the X homestead. My maiden name was X. Would it be okay if we walked around and took pictures--I have pictures from back when it was the X place." Actually, no; no it was not okay. This property no longer belonged to the Xs. It hadn't for at least 50 years.
They didn't say anything when I said, "no;" they just gave me a look indicating they thought I was rude and inhospitable and got in their big loud red truck and drove away. Although they were polite enough, I found the whole thing incredibly nervy and presumptuous. The property no longer belonged to a family member--whatever claim they thought they had to it was forfeited when it was sold.
Had I not been there working in the yard, I know they would have walked around and taken pictures to their hearts' contents--in short they would've reminisced and trespassed, commenting on how it all used to be, then gone to the fire hall for a nice lunch before driving back to Ohio, braking for anything even resembling a curve in the road.
When I told Brian about this today he offered to sit on the front porch in a wifebeater with a shotgun and bottle of bourbon, threatening any and all potential trespassers. Is that love or what?
~*~
Nurseries are bad places for me: too, too tempting. Today was especially rough--they got in a new delivery since I was there Saturday. So many cultivars and varieties that I wanted. So little space and cash and time.
2 comments:
godalmighty, what is the population of your town?
Fewer than a thousand I'd say.
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