Sometimes life’s little surprises produce a chain reaction of events that affect the garden. This is the story of one such chain.
About a year ago we decided that it was past time to paint the house. We signed a contract with the painter and resolved to get the exterior in perfect shape before the painter’s August first arrival. Unfortunately the old water damage on the southeast corner of the house was a little worse than first anticipated, making it necessary to gut and rebuild the guest bedroom on that side. I took in stride, though I was a bit taken aback the day I opened the door to the guest bedroom and saw nothing but air where the back wall should have been.
That little bit of construction forced me to pot up all the perennials that were growing in the upper back garden underneath the work zone. Twenty-four big pots later, all the peonies, daylilies, lavender and other plants were redistributed all over the property. Once I was able to stand erect again I decided that on balance all that potting-up was a good thing. After all, the daylilies did need dividing.
Debris cascaded down into the garden space, and I spent each evening of the summer picking bits of flashing, sandpaper, nails and stray pieces of insulation out of the adjacent sections of the garden. At least the spring flowering bulbs were safely under the ground, and every bird in the neighborhood was able to line her nest with genuine residential-grade insulating material.
Once the contractor finished with the southeast corner, he began replacing some damaged clapboards and decorative shingles on the back of the house. Since the majority of this work was on the wall that enclosed the master bathroom, we decided to move a poorly situated bathroom window. Unfortunately the whole area was open to the elements on a day when we had a severe and unexpected thunderstorm. This resulted in a partial collapse of the bathroom ceiling and water cascading down the walls of several rooms, including the newly constructed guest bedroom. The contractor’s helpers were nice enough to take all the ceiling pieces out of the bathtub for me. Once I moved all the toiletries, towels and other items to another bathroom, I decided that it was imperative for me to get out in the garden and weed vigorously for an hour or two. Weeding is a great stress reliever, and at the end of the day my front border looked wonderful. Afterwards I was rational enough to consider the contractor’s proposal for a total bathroom renovation.
As the exterior repairs neared completion and the first day of painting approached, I had an afternoon of intense aerobic exercise as I cut back a six year old climbing rosebush almost to the ground. Some of the branches were at least fifteen feet long, tied to two trellises affixed to the garage wall, but since we wanted the garage to be painted along with the house, the climber had to go. The canes were a bit thornier than I remembered, and I had to put a lot of antiseptic on my arms before I could trim back the equally large trumpet creeper vine from the trellising on the side of my back porch.
The painters finally came, enclosing the house in blue tarp as they sanded. A fine layer of grit covered everything, inside and out. We have clay soil, so a little sand actually makes a good soil amendment. I think that the sand on the rosebushes deterred a lot of aphids as well. Fortunately for us, we only had one rainy day for the entire two week painting period. The back garden, however, was full of porch furniture, potted up perennials and paint buckets, making watering difficult. I consoled myself with the thought that if any of the plants survived, they were truly worth all the effort that I had put into them.
Now the house looks wonderful with its fresh coat of paint. The new bathroom is coming along nicely, and eventually all the interior repairs will be completed as well. I planned a new and improved upper back garden, ordered twelve dwarf box bushes to surround it, and replanted all the potted-up perennials in a new arrangement. I even transplanted the trumpet creeper with the intention of growing it as a standard. It’s a good thing that my sciatica attack didn’t happen until the transplanting was finished.
I was thinking about the summer’s travails the other day, while I was standing in my front garden enjoying the peace and quiet. Everything looked so good that I felt truly blessed. My reverie was interrupted by a man who came up the front walk, introduced himself as an emissary of PSE&G, and told me all about the wonderful new gas lines that will be laid in my street over the next few weeks. Apparently I will also have a new gas line laid on my property, which will require some excavation with a machine called a “ditch witch”. When I asked where the trench would be, the man took a can of yellow spray paint and sprayed a line of drops right up the middle of my long flower border. I hadn’t planned on renovating this part of the border so late in the year, but since PSE&G has presented me with such a golden opportunity, I might as well do it. Besides, if I think about it long enough, I’m sure I’ll come up with a plan.