I have certainly known cats who got frayed around the edges when their owners were absent for a few days, and were only knitted whole again when the owners returned. So I'm not endorsing the following New Yorker-ish sentiment. I'm just repeating it, as something heard years ago that came back to me in the Adirondack chair this week: Dogs aren't the only animals who suffer when their owners leave; cats, too, go through a difficult phase of adjustment...as they divvy up the space formerly thought of as yours.
Now that the older plants in the garden are well-established, the new ones have begun to "take," and I'm irrigating less, the three other elements seem to be divvying up the space formerly thought of as water's. Earth... The ants continue piling it up in heaps, in all of the gravel beds. Those beds are expanding in the sunny areas in any case, as I plant more drought-lovers that prefer poor soil and rocky mulches. Fire... the sun is taking a toll now on the more delicate greenery as we top the 90°F mark, even as it brings the warm season grasses and Mediterranean and high desert plants to life. Anything that makes it through the coming baptism of heat and light without water to quench it is a garden stalwart indeed.
Air. I've been trying to foster a greater sense of airiness in this small, walled space—to get away from the dense layering of wetter, eastern gardens (even using xeric plants) and allow the plants (and me) more room to breathe.
 |
| Silky thread grass (Nassella tenuissima), desert olive (Forestiera neomexicana), and prairie flax (Linum lewisii) |
The more I learn to know and love plants adapted to the desert, the lighter the textures in the garden become. I'm beginning to have hopes for my strategy of low ground covers (if they ever fill in) with a few taller, airier things that have space to move freely in the wind
and to toss a little sunlight around while they're at it.
It's taken me almost five years to re-invent the wheel (not that I'm done yet); the planting style I'm aiming for is one more or less recommended in my favorite books on New Mexico gardening, though not in so many words. It took a while, though, for a particular set of garden dreams to vacate my brain, and then a while longer to divvy up the mental space that formerly belonged to them and make new ideas at home there.
I've never felt so much like a cat.
I love the blue flax in the first picture; it looks so cool and soothing, and of course flax is definitely an airy, moving plant.
ReplyDeleteThe second picture reminds me of the barley fields around my grandparents' farm; long-haired sheathes moving in the wind on a sunny summer day. Thank you for that flashback to my childhood summer holidays, though I suspect barley would perform miserably in your dry conditions...
Søren, I keep trying to decide whether the blue makes me think of sky or of water. The flowers have closed up or fallen by the time I get home from work, so weekend mornings when I see them open are an extra treat.
DeleteFields of grain in the wind... They really a magical sight, aren't they? Barley is probably much happier in Denmark.
instead of the same old same old, yours is going to be a uniquely beautiful place! From the first picture alone.
ReplyDeleteDiana, thank you--I certainly hope so! I'm happy with the direction it's beginning to go, but remember what Saxon Holt says, about how the camera always lies...
Deletehttp://kunm.org/post/gila-fire-track-be-largest-new-mexico-history
DeleteThis looks frightening!
We didn't really want to break last year's record for the largest fire... We had smoke here in the Q from it late last week--enough that the moon was red. The winds have dropped some, at least, so the firefighters have been able to get helicopters in. Best wishes to your nephew, if he's involved in the battle!
Delete("0% contained" is not a happy phrase!)
DeleteWhat a beautiful space..a feeling of cooler shade in a light and airy garden...so wonderful compared to my hot, humid and weedy garden right now...I love your new garden.
ReplyDeleteAh, Donna, thank you! That's exactly the feeling I'm hoping the garden will convey. How did you end up with hot and humid weather already?? You just finished winter, what, last week...
DeleteI can feel the breeze - delightful.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Karen.
DeleteI would be forever running my fingers through the nassella, Stacy and watching the glinting sunlight. I really must get myself an Adirondack chair - seems they bring on the thinking marvellously well. And you surprise me with your insights into cattishness - have I possibly misread your feelings toward them? Dave
ReplyDeleteDave, I've done quite a bit of that with the nassella myself. I'm still surprised that it's a native grass because it's so soft--it has a wicked relative here called needle grass which has barbed seeds that actually sew themselves into skin. Ouch. Especially hard on pets. Oh, you would love an Adirondack chair, especially after a mowing day. They bring on naps even better than they do thinking. And the arms are just the right size to hold a nice, cool drink. Re: cats, let's just say that if it were Christmas Eve I'd be willing to reach across the trenches and share a cigarette with one (if both the cat and I smoked, which we don't). Respect the enemy, kind of thing.
DeleteIt's hard to give up one's preconceived and sometimes entrenched notions of gardening in New Mexico. You adjusted more quickly than I did. I think it took me about ten years. :)
ReplyDeleteGirlSprout, I still don't quite understand why the same gardening style as elsewhere doesn't work, only with agastache and penstemon instead of hostas and bleeding hearts. But it sure doesn't!
DeleteThanks for the gorgeous photo of the Linum. I seem to have lost my flax plants (Linum perenne) this year; when I was in Maine in late April, they were happily putting up new green growth, but when I returned three weeks later I found only brown in those spaces. I don't know what happened, but seeing your photo makes me realize that I don't want to live without that wonderful blue and I need to replace them asap. -Jean
ReplyDeleteJean, I actually found myself thinking of your blue and yellow bed with that photo. How mysterious, that your flax should suddenly fizzle. Get thee to a nursery!
DeleteMy aim has always been to fill the flower beds till they are packed full of flowers - I haven't got there yet. The idea of air being a desired component never occurred to me. Your post has made me rebalance my mind about that.
ReplyDeleteb-a-g, I've always had the same aim. Being full of flowers does seem to be what flower beds ought to be best at. It's only logical. (Though not, apparently, here.) Still, if there are spaces in your garden that might not have filled in all the way yet, just consider them airy breathing places. Your cacti will be happy there some day...
DeleteIt's funny how so many of us have an idea in our minds of the perfect garden. And I imagine most of them look a lot out of a scene from The Secret Garden. For you to vacate preconceived ideas and plant what your space tells you it needs, that is success. And I love the way the grasses move about in the breeze. That seems to tell our minds "it's cool out here - see? the wind is blowing". I hope your garden continues to move toward the new vision in your mind.
ReplyDeleteHolley, you are so right! It's all about The Secret Garden. (Speaking of which, a maid who brought us steaming porridge on cold days and who took care of the laundry would be fine, too.) Thanks for the encouragement--uprooting all those preconceived notions was a lot harder than I would have expected. My brain has been perfectly ready to go in a new direction, but not so much the rest of me.
Delete