Listen to Your Garden Grow

My neighbour Sue, who to my everlasting sorrow is no longer with us, had the most magnificent spring garden you could imagine. Tens of thousands of bulbs planted over twenty years resulted in a riot of blooms over a period of a few weeks. The crocuses, tulips, daffodils, hyacinths in all colours were a spring magnet to anyone who regularly walked the neighbourhood.

Sue and I were kindred spirits in gardening (and in cooking and motherhood), but mine was a summer garden. She always encouraged me to plant bulbs, but I got so much joy from her garden which I could see from my front window, that I never felt the need for the early spring show. She started buying bulbs in bulk so that she could share them with her friends at a lower cost and I succumbed and told her I would take whatever she chose for me. Suddenly I was planting 200 to 250 bulbs a year in my very small back garden and even-smaller front-yard space.A number of years ago, I was out walking in the late evening at the time of year when the most robust of bulbs like tulips and daffodils are emerging. Through my whole walk I was hearing rustling around me and it wasn't until I reached my own house that I realized what it was making the noise. I was hearing shoots from the bulbs push their way out of the earth. Toronto is covered with trees and many gardeners allow the autumn leaves to cover their beds as extra protection against the cold. The kind of crackling I heard was the plant moving those dead leaves aside.

I was so astonished, I dragged my uninterested husband and my doubtful daughter out into the chill dark to hear what I heard. They agreed-heard it, pretty amazing-then returned to the warmth of the house. Not satisfied with their response I started banging on the doors of some of the neighbours who were gardeners and dragged them out into the night. Comically, more people joined us and about 10 of us stood around looking at my little plot of ground. And we listened and watched my garden grow by a few inches.

I didn't bang on Sue's door that night because I knew she was too ill to come out. She was disappointed to have missed the show, but she loved hearing about it. Now it has become a bit of a ritual for me and I do it every spring. Sue's garden doesn't really exist anymore, but every spring when my bulbs push their way through the earth I think of her and her gift to me.

The lesson in all of this is, of course, is that even in the midst of a totally urban environment, nature has a way of amazing and astonishing us every day, if only we listened.

Difficulty Level: Easy

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