Love Apple Alley

As I spent Wednesday morning pulling up out beautiful-but-dying tomato plants--no longer able to withstand the encroaching London winter--I thought it would be appropriate to write about them this week. I am already missing their leafy tops peaking over the bathroom window sill.

Also, as I've embarked as this poetry month long adventure with one particular, tomato-growing sasqitoon, this is also in honor of her inspiration.

An excerpt from today's rambling:

Then May, you came into view.

Slava peaked its head first, followed by
Black Prince and his brother, Krim.
Young Flamme came with an
unpronounceable Christian name, and
the German we nicknamed Blondie.

Sebastopol was the most surprising,
offering little to start other than a reminder
of home, but when the summer months blew in
and you each received your own room--
boy, did you blossom a plenty!

For Wednesday - Windowboxes

Just in the last few weeks, the windowboxes at my first floor office have been dug out and replaced with a gorgeous variety of flowers. I don't know the names of any of them except the largest one in the centre box--a chinese poppy. It's June though, and the flowers, well, they keep flowering and flowering. Each morning I arrive at the office, with its floor-to-ceiling windows full of light, and more blooms, more color full the window ledge. I pull up the window pane and lean out onto the ledge just to peek into the newest buds, the bumble bees gathering their nectar, the leaves proud and green.

Budding Mint

My mint plants got attacked by caterpillars this summer. Once I realized what was happening, it felt too late to stop it. And then I left home for 6 weeks and my plants in the care of a friend desperate for a green thumb. The Spearmint withered but held onto a few green leaves; the Pineapple turned brown and I put it in the corner of the garden, its pot and soil to be used again in the spring.

Sometime last week, though, I noticed the Spearmint had sprung new leaves--not my expectation as autumn is fast descending on the city of London. And yet, the little leaves are budding out wherever they can, including new shoots from the soil. It's as if fresh mint green is the must-have fashionable color of the season will all the work that plant is doing.

And then this morning, taking out the compost as you do, I stopped by my mint (and rose, for it's standing taller these days as well) and looked over into the soil of the Pineapple mint: little fuzzy two-toned leaves are climbing from the soil up. The entire plant previously resting above the soil is brown and dry, but somewhere, deep in the root system, something persisted. Something said, let's grow.

Ruby

Seriously, Ruby is staring to lilt, and look really pale. I think I have let my first (and favorite) cactus die.

I don't know what to do. Universe?

Ruby, Milligan, Big Ben and Santa Maria

My cacti are dying.

Well, three of my cacti are dying: Ruby went pale and dry, first; then Milligan caught a bad case of vitiligo at his base; finally I noticed, Santa Maria, in all her squat, radiant glory, browning up one side. I can't say they are dying for sure--I am a new cactus mama--but there is definitely something amiss.

A friend says it is probably rot. She suggests cactus food and replanting them. I am to check the root in the replanting process, though, to ensure that it hasn't rotted. If it has, there is not much to be done, like lung cancer apparently.

I would more than happily go out and buy my cactus family whatever it needs, and indeed I have wanted to be the provider of such wonders as cactus food, but I have stopped myself from even looking. "Where in England am I going to find cactus food!?" my mind inquires while I let it get away with it.

I live in a city, a very large city, in fact, and one can get about almost anything here. Plus, I bought the cactus IN ENGLAND, after all. It was just a few days before New Years, a few days before my new life in London and I wanted a little piece of California to come home with me.

We named them in the car park: Ruby for her bulbous red head; Milligan after Spike: tall, skinny and wiry; Big Ben for being just the right height with a little extra on top; and Santa Maria, the spines are so dense on top that one sees brown instead of the body of green--basically, I always liked the name of the city as a child and somehow it just fit.

And now they are dying. Ironic somehow that the only one seemingly making it in our damp, English flat is the one named after an iconic piece of London. Maybe Big Ben liked the chilly air and the keeping moist after March. I hoped the desk lamp would warm the rest, revive them. I don't know how to have a cactus funeral.

My Little Plants

Lately, my morning schedule has been like this:

Wake up to Alex's alarm, drift in and out of sleep until she kisses me goodbye.
Wake up for reals and decide that, yeah, it is a good idea to get out of bed.
Make breakfast, tea, check email.
Water my plants.

Spearmint, Coriander, Basil, Pineapple Mint

And while my basil and coriander are still puzzling me in their state of healthiness, the mints and especially the rose plant look gorgeous.

House-warming Rose plant and
the most inaccurate watering can on the planet.


Look at all the new leaves!

Royal Vegetables

When Michelle Obama planted the White House vegetable garden, I was pretty impressed. Just a few months after the inauguration, my hope in the new administration was renewed again as the Obama's modeled the possibilities of practicing one's values--in my case trying to figure out how to work towards sustainability in my every day life. All very American, in some ways.

Living in England, I wasn't expecting Gordon Brown to do anything similiar. But, I'd forgotten about the Royal Family. Ah, the Royal Family--their national and international role as a reigning family is still elusive to me, but when I brought up The Guardian this morning to see that one of the top headlines was 'Queen turns corner of palace backyard into an allotment,' I was duly impressed!

I doubt I'll become a Royalist, but I'm digging this grow-your-own in high places.

Blueprints for the Garden

First, I love hanging wash on the line. Ever since I lived in Ireland and learned that clotheslines were not only prevalent in the rainiest country in Europe, but that they prevailed, in all sizes and forms, throughout the continent. It was while I was hanging out the wash that I started to look around the garden.

We have spearmint, pineapple mint, basil, coriander/cilantro, and a rose bush in ceramic pots. Everything else, from what I can tell of the different shaped bushes and vines, are either shrubs that have been planted for decoration and to take up space or plants that have settled there--blue bells, ivy, grasses, bramble, and a few other wildflowers.

But I want to plant vegetables, lavender and wildflowers, the question is where. I think, slowly, I'm going to start taking back the garden from the landlord-semi-manicured rented garden:

• Move the herbs to the guest bedroom windowsill.
  
• Install hanging baskets for tumbling tomatoes.
• Sow lavender indoors to be eventually planted in the corner nook by the BBQ.
  
• Clear space in the side bed & plant tomatoes and courgettes/zucchini to start.
• Sow wildflowers for the bees.

I'm just hoping June's not too late.

Dragonfly Eggs

At dinner al fresco this evening, I noticed something white tucked into the leaves of the plants around the garden. My love says they are dragonfly eggs.

I have dragonfly eggs growing in my garden. Grow, babies, grow.

On Gardening

My hands smell like sunscreen
and I feel as if I have been tending
my domain, marking my territory.

The bushes overgrown
needed cutting back.
The bramble was being unkind.
The collection of herbs
were dry and thirsty.

Moving a pot here,
clipping a branch there,
sweeping and composting
my own bit of green.

Mint

The first cup of peppermint tea
drunk round the aluminum
table; downstairs kitchen,
the hardwood floor,
the arches.

***

Lemon mint grown wild
along the Salmon River.
We took it home in soil,
a plastic bag; it survived
the winter.

***

Our herb garden is growing
by pots and plants. First,
basil and coriander from seed.
Spearmint and a pineapple
variety bought special.


for FF, Dad, and love