My Mother In My Garden

I spent a good chunk of time in the garden on Sunday. I had flowers to pot up for the front steps, and plants gotten at the garden club sale to put in the ground. There was a bleeding heart that was eating a corner of the perennial bed, a bleeding heart so big it had collapsed of its own sheer exuberance (abetted by a heavy rain). Even though it was still kind of in full bloom, I heartlessly dug it up and divided it in half. Here's hoping it survives. I impaled myself trying to prune the flowering quince, getting intractable thorns stuck in both hands. By the time I was done, I was filthy and sore, and oh so very pleased with myself.

It's impossible for me to work in the garden without thinking of my mother. Hers was her joy. A chore, to be sure, but a joy. She was ever shuffling hosta; I do the same. Her plants are scattered through my yard - hosta, astilbe, sedum - and solomon's seal running up along the front steps.



The sign was hers, bought in France, brought home and mounted on a bit of plywood. It faded terribly, its white letters all chalked off a few years after she got it. But she loved it so, and so painstakingly repainted all the little letters. You can't tell from a distance, but up close? It bears her brushmarks. And I think that's a bit of her standard issue hosta in the lower right hand corner.



It amuses me no end to have her sign living in my own garden. Little children are particularly perplexed, because (as yet) none of them speak French. If you come visit, you're not allowed pick the mushrooms (we've only toadstools), but I might send you home with a piece of hosta.