Today and yesterday, the Concord Museum Guild of Volunteers has been running the 19th annual Concord Garden Tour, where you can pay $35 to tour selected private gardens in this town.
I was reminded of this fact yesterday when I looked out my kitchen window and saw several elderly people brightly dressed and carrying brochures being led through the driveway of my neighbors across the back fence, the ones who live in the pink Victorian house.
Hélas, the tour will not stop at my house. This is partly because I am an indifferent gardener, a non-competitive amateur who plops things in the ground when she thinks of it and can afford it, who waters resentfully, really thinking that as soon as she does so the rain will come (and not always wrong about that), and highly reluctant to weed because any apparent weed might actually be a native wildflower, or even something invasive but beautiful. The most anyone gets paid to till our soil is whatever our landlord pays the people who come and mow the lawns, or what pass for lawns, irregularly and indifferently approximately every seven to ten days in the summer, and who collect all the fallen gold off the putative lawns in autumn.
Therefore, the adorable tourists in their happiness-tinted rainwear will be treated to none of the following sights:
The invasive wild rose clambering up a trellis surrounding my downstairs neighbors' front porch, pleasing the bees and filling my studio for at least two weeks every June with the most amazing sugary scent, nothing like what you might think of when you think of the scent of a rose, more like a cross between wisteria and sweet pea --
The forest of sunflowers the squirrels have planted in my parking strips (and EVERYWHERE else), and will no doubt harvest at the proper time --
The damp red verbena which I finally got in the ground and which is of a species so hybridized it is without scent (but it only cost $4.00 at the grocery store and it's pretty) --
The Eremerus bungeii finally setting its brushy bud clusters after, what, two years? -- and which I cannot help but wonder if the squirrels will decapitate on principle (they are ruthless farmers with little aesthetic sense I can appreciate) --
My rodent farmers chastising the neighborhood cats (no sound because my true love was on the phone, and it obscured the squirrely squawks; sorry) --
All the beautiful birds who come to my feeders (same story with audio, I'm afraid).
I'm sure it's a very good tour, though. There are many expensive, well thought out and well tended gardens in town, and a great many enthusiasts of natural beauty. Anyone who wants to see that other stuff can just come here.
The anti-elitist in me really appreciated this post, and the creative spirit in me did too, thanks to your lyrical ode to the ordinary.
Posted by: em | June 08, 2008 at 08:30 PM
Hee -- I'm glad you enjoyed it Em.
And really, there are some glorious, sumptuous gardens around here, front and back, not many formal ones, mostly just spectacularly floral ones. And if I had the money, I would absolutely pay one of the organic landscapers I know to do more with my garden than I am, perhaps leaving a little bit less to the squirrels but not everything. But I have to admit that I rather enjoy some of the fruits of my own haphazardness, and it makes me happy to be able to share them with others who can appreciate them, too (with zero price of admission). :)
Posted by: Sara | June 10, 2008 at 04:22 PM