how does your garden grow
Sunday, 6 May 2012 10:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yatiI originally was going to write about how the garden is a mess, and how it's the first thing that gets abandoned when I'm tired or have too much work or (oh just admit it) when I'm too depressed to do anything but flop on the couch. I've been tempted to just pave the whole area so we'd have more parking space but I didn't really like the idea of not having space to plant things (even if all the plants do is die).
It was really horrible this time (the garden, not the other things. Though those were no fun either); it was looking like tropical rainforest outside instead of a garden. Weeds everywhere, the heliconias springing out of their beds, plants dead from not enough watering. So I spent most of this weekend pruning and weeding and hacking and repotting stuff and now the garden looks a bit more like a garden.
I was watering the plants and clearing up the garden tools when there's suddenly this lady at my gate, smiling at me. I almost dropped the hose in surprise -- there are always kids passing by and making noise and parents pushing strollers and this old makcik on a bicycle, but no one ever really stops. Sometimes I talk to the people next door, but I've never been a particularly friendly neighbour.
So I went over to the gate and this lady asked, "I've been wondering if it's ok -- I've been looking at those orange flowers outside and if it would be all right if I took a few bulbs?" I might have gaped at her for a moment and told her she was very much welcomed to them; I started planting them outside because we had too many of those. (I didn't even care much for the flowers, to be honest, but I had felt like I couldn't just dispose of the extra bulbs.) She said the red heliconias that I have were very nice too and I had to bite down a laugh because I was just cursing those hours before, and I offered her a whole pot of those. She was delighted.
Her husband came by and told me that I had a nice garden and I must love plants very much -- I managed a thank you without bursting into laughter -- and I told them to come over again if they wanted more. (They lived a few streets away, which probably explains why they didn't look familiar.) "She's been eyeing those orange ones for ages," the husband said wryly.
So now I have some new acquaintances called Maggie and Albert who think my garden is nice. Maybe working on that garden isn't such a bad thing after all.
It was really horrible this time (the garden, not the other things. Though those were no fun either); it was looking like tropical rainforest outside instead of a garden. Weeds everywhere, the heliconias springing out of their beds, plants dead from not enough watering. So I spent most of this weekend pruning and weeding and hacking and repotting stuff and now the garden looks a bit more like a garden.
I was watering the plants and clearing up the garden tools when there's suddenly this lady at my gate, smiling at me. I almost dropped the hose in surprise -- there are always kids passing by and making noise and parents pushing strollers and this old makcik on a bicycle, but no one ever really stops. Sometimes I talk to the people next door, but I've never been a particularly friendly neighbour.
So I went over to the gate and this lady asked, "I've been wondering if it's ok -- I've been looking at those orange flowers outside and if it would be all right if I took a few bulbs?" I might have gaped at her for a moment and told her she was very much welcomed to them; I started planting them outside because we had too many of those. (I didn't even care much for the flowers, to be honest, but I had felt like I couldn't just dispose of the extra bulbs.) She said the red heliconias that I have were very nice too and I had to bite down a laugh because I was just cursing those hours before, and I offered her a whole pot of those. She was delighted.
Her husband came by and told me that I had a nice garden and I must love plants very much -- I managed a thank you without bursting into laughter -- and I told them to come over again if they wanted more. (They lived a few streets away, which probably explains why they didn't look familiar.) "She's been eyeing those orange ones for ages," the husband said wryly.
So now I have some new acquaintances called Maggie and Albert who think my garden is nice. Maybe working on that garden isn't such a bad thing after all.
