I was working on the boulevard when a neighbour driving by pulled over to say: “Anything you need — just let me know.”
Noting the puzzled look on my face, Kim explained she could do some grocery shopping for me if I preferred to remain home because of the pandemic that had just been proclaimed.
That morning, Kim’s April “dream cruise” of a lifetime had been cancelled. She and husband, Bob, decided that day to stay home, and plant a food garden. I offered help with that.
Not an hour later, another neighbour appeared in the back garden for a short visit. We spoke of various other neighbours and their possible needs in rapidly changing conditions that will require us to join forces and take care of each other. Similar conversations are likely taking place in communities all over Vancouver Island and our country.
I have great hopes for Kim’s food garden. May it bring great pleasure. I’ve been actively rejoicing in a garden filled with fresh vegetables this past winter. It’s been a time of feasting on leeks and kale, carrots, beets and parsnips.
I’m so glad I took the time at the start of July to seed bok choy, daikon winter radishes, and a second crop of carrots. Now the spring planting has begun. Gardeners have much to be grateful for. In times like these, more than ever the garden is a place of solace as well as sustenance.
Changing times. The new realities of life brings major concerns for the many who have lost employment. In my own immediate family, one of us has had both self-employed and “gig” work evaporate overnight. The situation is no doubt replicated in large numbers of families.
Keeping safe distancing in mind, we can help. Share food from the garden. Share seeds and plants.
Help someone start a food garden. Pass along any extra, suitable containers for someone to grow cheering flowers and edibles in.
Some of the soup I’ll be making when I finish this writing will be passed along. It will be a nutritious creation, filled with garden vegetables.
An abrupt change to the creation of these columns has come with sudden cancellations of garden events that I had lined up to include in columns. At the start of the season, with so many plant sales and workshops planned, disappointment is a major theme in the messages I’ve received.
One, however, held an uplifting note. It was notice of the April Victoria Horticultural Society meeting being cancelled.
“Stay safe and everyone remember: Gardening is not cancelled. Being outside and enjoying your garden or other spaces is one of the safest places to be right now.”
Seeds. From late January or early February onward, one of the first things I do each morning is check the seeded flats lying under plastic covers on the dining room table.
Seeds occupy the lives and minds of avid gardeners at this time in the year. Like many gardening friends of mine, I have the next seeds to be planted outdoors lined up on a table near the door into the garden.
A tray in the dining room holds the next seeds due for indoor sowing. I’m constantly rifling through my large envelops full of seed packets, filed by the month of planting, to pull out the next group of seeds to deal with.
As a seed flat check starts my day, sorting through and thinning out the contents of book shelves occupies the evenings, including a collection of poetry books kept from my university and teaching years. As I leafed through pages of familiar poetry, I stopped to re-read a short poem that fits the planting season perfectly. It’s The Seed Shop.
“Here in a quiet and dusty room they lie,
Faded as crumbled stone or shifting sand,
Forlorn as ashes, shrivelled, scentless, dry —
Meadows and gardens running through my hand.”
GARDEN EVENTS
HCP workshops. The Horticulture Centre of the Pacific, 505 Quayle Rd. in Saanich, is suspending all community education classes until further notice. The HCP gardens will remain open by donation, for now. Government House volunteering. The Orientation meeting for potential new gardening volunteers in the Government House gardens, 1401 Rockland Ave., slated for April 2, has been cancelled. Anyone interested in volunteering in the gardens can contact Kathryn and Dorothy at [email protected] for information.
