Elizabeth's Legacy

For twenty years, my back yard was a dog yard. I mowed it, cleaned up after the dogs, and left it alone. The city did sewer work one year, dug a huge hole (two dogs fell in), and tore out some mature photina, replacing them with 3-gallon plants which the male dogs promptly peed on and killed. The grass went from weeds to bare. It was an eyesore.
By this spring Greg, my all-purpose lawn guy/neighbor/friend, had restored the grass, and Elizabeth began putting plants at the corner of the apartment and scattering a bit of statuary--mostly Buddhas--around the yard. She hung bird feeders in the trees, and a birdcage. Then Jordan brought a table they were not using, and we dragged plastic chairs out of the garage storage space. Elizabeth, Jordan and I began to have happy hour out there.

Yard table--we can't figure out what happened to the fourth chair

 

In the back of my mind, I'd always toyed with the idea of a deck outside the back door but to look at what? A barren waste? But now I could see a garden beginning to emerge. The idea of a deck had more appeal, so I talked to the contractor who keeps my house in shape, and he drew up plans. By my birthday in mid-July we were celebrating with dinner on the deck and tables on the lawn.

I love the stepping stones to nowhere

They used to go from the apartment to the back door so the boys wouldn't bring in mud

 

The yard now sports a bottle tree--Jacob and Elizabeth put it up Sunday, a yard flag, new rose bushes that will grow tall and bushy and block out the garage behind us.

Bottle tree--note to the left a rose bush that will be much bigger next year

and to the right Turk's cap

 

For the birthday party, Susan cleaned up the bed on their side of the yard and laid pavers out to form a bed, though it's so shady coleus may be the only thing that will grow there. I found a cherub-like figure in the back of my closet to take the place of the Buddhas that are moving to Pennsylvania, and Melinda from my office brought me a wonderful flying purple pig.

The deck table has all the amenities--a bug-repellent lantern that really works, two candle-like lamps in iron containers, a small fountain that bubbles and gurgles. Oh, and at some cost, we have electric power. We need to deck the deck with tiny white lights.

 

The yard flag, with Susan's new bed to the right; doghouse in front right

with a child's chair Susan added for whimsy



The yard is still a work in progress, but it's changed so much over one summer. And if Elizabeth hadn't put out those petunias and statues, it never would have happened. Her legacy, of course, goes far beyond the tangible things of the garden to deeper levels of friendship and sharing. It's been a great year for each of us, and I'm sad that just as we've figured out a pretty good way to balance our independent lives with living on the same property, she's moving. She believes the Universe moves as it should; I believe God has a plan for each of us. We're moving on, but I can sit on my deck and stare at my garden and silently thank her.
Actually we've decided I can sit on the deck, and she can sit on her patio, each of us with wine, and share our usual evening catch-up sessions by texting.

A computer lesson hard learned and a good dinner

This afternoon as I worked in my office, I saw strange shadows flitting all around--it was the Mylar balloons left from this weekend's fun. They were floating on the ceilings in the house, and I learned the hard way that once they lose buoyancy and drift, they can set off a motion detector. So I took them outside and tied them to a porch chair, where they blew in the breeze and looked really cool. Late in the afternoon, I realized they had drifted loose from their moorings and were anchored in the crape myrtle, so I untied them and fastened them more securely to the chair. When they deflate, I'll discard them, but I'm enough of an environmentalist not to let them float off in space. The other picture is of the bottle tree Colin assembled and installed for me this weekend--the kids carried bottles to him. I had a bottle tree several years ago, made from a fallen branch of the big tree in my front yard, but as wood will do, it rotted. I saved the colorful bottles, and now they have a new life. They, like the garden, need a good rain--I didn't have time to rinse them before Colin put them up. I really like the color they add to my yard and am petitioning friends for colorful, empty wine bottles. As usual, the colors don't show up well in my photo, nor do the cone flowers, which are really gorgeous.

Lesson for the day: do not spill wine on your wireless remote keyboard. It causes it to type gibberish instead of what you mean to type. I woke early this morning worrying about that and a couple of other problems, but it turns out I can move my laptop so that I can easily type on it, while looking at the larger screen on my remote monitor. I've ordered a new keyboard/mouse set, although my mouse still works well. I was afraid it wouldn't with a new keyboard. Jordan giggled when I told her this and asked, "Am I allowed to tell this story?"

Betty and I had our weekly dinner tonight and really lucked out--we went to a wine bar that I haven't been to in a while. Their happy hour specials included $5 chardonnay (pretty good) and tuna sliders--four baguette slices topped with a horseradish-flavored cabbage-and-carrot slaw and small slices of Ahi tuna.I ordered that, and it was delicious. Betty had chicken quesadillas, made with blue corn tortillas and was equally pleased. I think each appetizer portion (plenty for dinner) was $6. Came home in time to catch part of President Obama's brief speech on the oil crisis.

Yesterday, on Facebook, a friend pointed out the irony of the state Republican convention voting to call for an end to the ban on deep-water drilling but to ban strip clubs. Someone wrote that she was sure God was a lot more concerned with strip clubs than the oil spill in the gulf. I couldn't restrain myself: if God is bothered by strip clubs, I wrote, I'm sure he's devastated by the Gulf disaster. Talk about apples (miniature) and oranges.