In case you were wondering, this is not about a new pot dispensary. It is about watching plants grow in the gardens around my house and neighborhood. I’m trying not to add “wither” to that list. Every evening I look skyward for signs of clouds and rain to add the moisture they need — moisture I’m finding difficult to provide when early-morning temperatures become oven-like before I step outside.
We used to have boxwood shrubs around two sides of the house. These were old, overgrown and so misshapen by the time we purchased our home that it was difficult for the two of us to properly manage them. When I became the sole groundskeeper, I decided to remove and replace them with something easier to maintain that yielded more color and eye interest. I added hydrangeas, rhododendrons and azaleas in early May and recently interspersed them with seasonal dahlias.
A densely weeded, long patch of garden marks the property line dividing our land from our neighbor’s field. Perhaps “densely weeded” is too strong a term. It’s a space where orange lilies proliferate, with stock and iris as its other primary residents. They survive through a tangle of vines and not a few tough stands of deeply rooted somethings that do nothing but grow tall and bear uninteresting leaves with very tiny buds and flowers that yellow and die after absorbing all the moisture from the ground. Perhaps these plants are useful in a capacity of which I am unaware, but for now, they offer me neither food, herbal seasoning nor beauty in the space I call “garden.”
Earlier this year I began digging up and replanting small sections of this plot. I added two small Japanese willows and two peonies while leaving enough clearance to elevate and separate the iris tubers already in place. My reward was seeing irises in bloom for the first time in years and watching the willows and peonies grow and thrive.
Now that the irises have faded and the lilies are again budding, preparing to bloom, it is still far too crowded. My task this fall will be to dig up everything I deem a weed, including the surplus lilies and stock. I would love to get to it this summer, but I fear the heat will sap my energy, particularly if we keep experiencing days with record-breaking temperatures.
My inspiration to take on these projects was a garden a few hundred yards up the road. I pass this spot every time I take the shortest route to Route 101 heading either east or west. It offers passers-by a three-season bounty of color, created with a designer’s eye. An ever-changing and interesting mix of plant life and foliage merges in a pleasing blend of sizes and shapes within the confines of this triangle where Isaac Frye Highway meets Wilton Center Road. There is even a bench for human visitors and a birdhouse for those of the avian variety.
The house across the street once faced a handsome, but now deceased, maple that grew in this triangle. Its demise created terrain devoid of all visible life. That was until these neighbors hired an expert gardener, who happened to also be a relative, to create a floral retreat designed to fill the void.
This garden has been an inspiration to all of us who live close enough to appreciate what it has added to our daily drives or walks on Isaac Frye. I’ve often stopped to rest on that bench to take in the beauty and variety of the plants in leaf or the flowers in bud and bloom that surround me — something that could not have happened before this garden existed. Previously, a walk on Isaac Frye, when hot or tired, meant searching for a nearby shaded stone wall to rest upon. Finding a bench was only a fantasy. And finding one in a garden for all to visit along the way was unimaginable, until it was.