The Inadvertent Gardener

Note: Part 1 of this story appeared on Monday.

The heavy wooden door opened onto a series of squared-off brick passageways, open to the elements, yet almost private, with their series of variegated columns and keyhole windows. We stepped into a series of garden rooms, high above the rest of the city.

According to the signs, the gardens feature a café in warmer weather, but I was glad it was too cold for icy glasses of Coke and petit fours. The gardens belonged to me and Alex, and we roamed through it, peering through windows and looking at the wildness that had been brought on by the waning Fall.

“I bet this is beautiful when it’s all blooming,” I said.

We stopped to look at birds playing in a dry fountain, admired the stone work, peered through an opening in the wall toward the George Washington Bridge in the distance.

Then I caught site of the tree I had seen from below the Cloisters.

“I don’t think that’s an apple tree at all,” I said. “It’s a quince!”

And sure enough, it was. Smack in the middle of the more open of the gardens, there were four quince trees still laden with overripe fruit.

The last time I had seen a quince tree was by the pool that our townhouse community in Madrid shared when I lived there growing up. All it took was the smell of the slightly decaying fruit to take me back there.

The rest of the garden showed what an amazing place it must be at the peak of its season, too. Ivy clambered the walls in thick swaths; three kinds of sage, each one bushier than the next, stood together; a huge ornamental cabbage would have lumbered about if it could have picked up its roots.

I spotted Lamb’s Ear and made Alex touch it—it is, after all, the softest plant in the world. And we took photos of each other in a variety of archways—if you can’t be photogenic at the Cloisters, you might not be photogenic anywhere, really…

In 20 minutes, we were thoroughly chilled by the November air and ready to return to the medieval art. We ducked back in the heavy door, and a few folks in the museum itself looked at us with surprise. Who would be outside on such a day? What could there possibly be to see?

All I can say is this: sometimes the best things in the world are behind the doors we aren’t sure about opening. The Cloisters gardens? They rank right up there.

As we approached the Cloisters from further down the hill, I pointed up to a tree peeking over the top of a walled garden. “Look, an apple tree!” I said to my friend Alex. “I wonder if we can get in there?”

Inside the museum, we wandered amidst Madonnas and child, friezes and tapestries, but seemed as if we were up far too high to access the garden where we would find that tree.

A guard stood to one side of a gallery, his eyelids drooping a bit. We sidled up to him.

“How are you doing?” I asked.

“A little tired,” he said.

We talked about the weather, and why he was tired, and George Bush before I finally felt like we’d had enough small talk to broach the issue at hand. “From outside,” I said, “we could see an apple tree. Can we get to it?”

A slow grin spread across his face. “Down these stairs and to the left, and you will see a door right in front of you. Go outside it, and there it will be.”

Alex and I scurried down the steps until we came upon a heavy wooden door. It had no sign on it, and for a moment, I feared we were about to set off an alarm.

“Do you think it’s OK?” I asked, my hand poised to push.

“Sure,” she said. “Go ahead.”

Stay tuned for Part 2 of this story, which will appear on Wednesday…

The South is running out of water.

I discovered this after I asked some fellow members of the 9rules community about how they had celebrated Blog Action Day, and one linked to their post on the mess that is the Georgia water table.

I’m clearly losing my edge out here in the Midwest. Ordinarily, the fact that there wasn’t going to be enough water to cool the power plants that run Christmas lights from North Carolina to Florida would not escape my notice. But somehow, I’d heard nothing.

The last Friday in October, I boarded a plane bound for Raleigh, North Carolina, heading to visit good friends and show my support for the NC State Wolfpack. I’d gotten the weather forecast from my friend and commenter NC Heather - rain all week, but dry for the game. Besides, my friends are not ones to have any kind of shortage of NC State clothing, and that includes a prodigious amount of rain gear. If the rain didn’t stop, I’d be covered.

As the plane ascended, the pilot said something about downpours that were expected to have passed over by the time we landed, and, in fact, North Carolina was soaking wet when I arrived. Out in Rob and Heather’s back yard, all the plants looked luscious and thrilled with the water infusion.

But the newspaper the next morning reminded everyone that water restrictions were still in effect-even with five inches of rainfall in a week, drought conditions still held steady.

This week, the news has continued to be dire. The governor of Georgia has apparently been holding prayer services with the specific request for rain, and he’s going to have a little sit-down with the governors of Florida and Alabama to try to address the problem.

I’m not really sure how you address the problem when you aren’t the sky, but whatever. I wish them luck. In the meantime, according to reports I’ve been reading, there’s a town in Tennessee where the mayor turns on the water for three hours each night, then turns it off.

I know there are gardeners out there who consider it anathema to actually water their plants, preferring instead to let their flowers and vegetables and herbs just roll with whatever weather happens to be in play, whether that be drought or wet conditions. I like to think I wouldn’t be the neighbor sneaking out to water my tomatoes in the dark, but they would be my tomatoes… I just might crack under the pressure.

Every time I visit my parents, there’s a little pile of things to read on my bed when I arrive—a conglomeration of programs from my mother’s concerts, news clippings, and other things my parents think I should read or see.

(I can hear my Dad right now…”Things your mother thinks you should read or see!)

This past weekend, when I arrived at their house, the pile included something a little bit unusual: a paper bag that had clearly once held produce. Interesting to look at? Sure. But it wasn’t until my Mom said hello to a mother and her son in the aisle of a jazz concert Friday night that I learned the true significance.

“Andrew, did you enjoy the concert?” she asked. The boy nodded fiercely, a giant grin on his face. As he and his mother continued up the aisle away from us, my Mom said, “He’s such a great kid. And such a wonderful singer. And he sells tomatoes!”

“Wait,” I said. “He’s the one who sells the tomatoes in the bag?”

Clearly I had already mastered brand recognition. And, in fact, that’s who it was. I had met the famous Andrew: Children’s choir member, jazz lover, tomato salesman.

The scoop is this, according to my parents: Andrew sets up a big sign that advertises his wares; has negotiated some sort of deal with his grandfather, who supplies the tomatoes (and by deal, I do mean deal…my understanding is that Andrew’s supplier offers him something along the lines of a 100 percent discount on his supplies, which has to work out to a heck of a profit margin); wraps the tomatoes up in self-branded bags; and sells them to one and all within the neighborhood. [Note: this information has been updated to reflect inside scoop passed along in the comments below!]

It’s definitely a step above the average lemonade stand. I’m pretty impressed.

For two years, plants with dark green leaves and small blue flowers have wound their way around the base of my tomato plants, appearing as suddenly as fireflies and disappearing by the next day. I would think to photograph them, then forget, then return to find only green, no blue.

This year, I remembered to capture them, and I planned to post them up, see if anyone could identify them. After all, there are times when even Google doesn’t come up with the right answer for “small blue wild flower that looks like it should be on the side of a china cup.”

Lucky for me, I know people. Before I could even post my own shot of one of these beauties, Don of An Iowa Garden identified it for me: Asiatic dayflower.

This is one of those weeds, like Queen Anne’s Lace, that I would plant on purpose if I had the right set of seeds. Especially now that I know what they are.