Tuesday, June 23 2009

Getting My Back Into It

Mary, Mary, quite contrary . . .

Y'know, I feel a bit guilty most of the time because I'm always running late with deadlines, blogs and projects, being a natural born procrastinator. I'd like to think I have good excuses, like spending the weekend working in my garden, teaching the cats to skeet-shoot or building a cathedral out of Popsicle sticks, but if you use a good excuse one day, you'll use a bad excuse the next, I suppose.

As tough as I am on myself, it's even worse when my dear old Papa gently reminds me he hasn't seen a new blog entry in quite a while! Man, the pressure is terrible! I took him out for lunch the other day, in honour of Father's Day, plus because I like to spend time with him. We went out to the Kingfisher in Maple Ridge. Located right next to the old Albion Ferry docks, it's a pretty nice joint with a good view:

Ahoy matey's, has anyone seen White Rock Willie about?

When I was a kid we used to ride our bikes onto the ferry for a day of tootling around the back roads of Fort Langley. That was many a year ago, and now there's a new giant bridge to whisk people over the river without actually going across it. Progress, I guess.

My da, not-yet 76. Thanks for lunch, Papa.

Funny thing about the passage of time is, when I left my father's house I swore that after a decade of indentured servitude being his garden-monkey I would never lift a shovel in anger again. So what's the first thing I did when I got settled into a place of my own? Planted a garden, of course.

Where's Waldo? Right where I buried him . . .

In addition to the plot I have at Dunsmuir Community Garden I have a little yard at my condo. We live on the second floor, and have a patio and a greenspace. I've got a couple hundred square feet of lawn, lilies, snap dragons, rose bushes, peonies, a dozen herbs (a giant rosemary bush, sage, three kinds of oregano, thyme, four kinds of mint, etc) wolfsbane, lemon verbena, strawberries, hens and chicks, basil (lots and lots) and dozens of others. We started from bare dirt, and in only a couple of years we've got a great space for ourselves and the kitties.

Where did you say you got these seeds from?

I get so much out of gardening I can't imagine living without it. It's exercise, it's meditation, it's fresh organic herbs, vegetables and flowers, it's a retreat from travel and work stress, it's a place where I learn patience and take rewards from gentle husbandry and nurturing, and it's a place where I can fully connect to the earth around me, to the soil that supports us all, and to the discipline and work ethic that I was taught by the example of my parents and all the other gardeners in my family.

That's something worth putting your back into. Thanks again for the lessons. Pop.

Posted by Tim AT 5:52PM

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