Lilac Sunday, every spring, at the Arnold Arboretum, in Boston.
— Photo by John Phelan
Pea flowers in spring
— Photo by Rasbak
Adapted from Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com
“All gardening is an act of faith, but in no work in the garden is the chasm that faith must leap wider or deeper than in planting peas. In the North, where peas grow best, they are planted in April, which around here is called a spring month only out of courtesy to the equinox, much as you might call a mean, stingy and detested family acquaintance ‘Uncle’ Adolf.’’’
-- Castle Freeman Jr. (born 1944) in Spring Snow (1995), American author who lives in Vermont.
I’m always a bit surprised at this time of year at how quickly life comes back in bright colors, motion and smell after the freezing sterile nights of winter. Insects buzzing away, worms wiggling, birds rioting and leaves and flowers opening theatrically – on a warm day, fast. And far too swiftly, petals of flowering trees drop on the ground, making what looks like an Impressionist painting that seems to fade as you look down on it.
People fortunate enough to have gardens feel exuberant now and line up various projects for the growing season, which continues to lengthen as the years roll by. They haven’t yet grown weary of weeding, and they probably won’t have to water for a while.
Or maybe they’ll say the hell with it and take out a second mortgage so they can go to Fenway.
I used to be surprised at learning about people who grew up on farms, as my maternal grandfather did, and then went off to make money in physically much easier, white-collar ways but in middle age bought a little farm as a hobby. That’s what my grandfather, who became a (mostly corporate) lawyer, did in Minnesota, with raising a few representatives of each major type of farm animal on the premises of his little farm, which he mostly visited on weekends and paid a couple to look after much of the time. Nostalgia for gritty work.
