Planting Memories

Always a gnome--many years before they were popular.

I am just now in from the garden, having gone out to pay the lovely family that takes care of my lawn. I’m perfectly capable of cutting my own grass—but the weed eater and I do not get along. Those seasons I spent working at Home Depot taught me everything I ever needed to know about weed whackers, except how not to throw it at the side of the house when it pisses you off.

If I’m honest, mowing the lawn is fine in the spring, but by May I remember that I live in Alabama now, and I give it up. The same goes for the gardens. I love the spring planting but not the summer bugs, weeds, and endless watering.

I added a few new perennials this year, and while I was puttering around, I began thinking about how I had, without intention, created a memory garden. I have a pink camellia in the front because it reminds me of the first time my mother visited me in Georgia. It was December then, and pink camellias were blooming alongside our church. She was new to the South and was taken by flowers in December. Every house I’ve lived in since then, I plant camellias.

The same goes for hydrangeas. They remind me of my parents' summer home in Rhode Island. They grew so well in that sandy, acidic soil that they reached the rooftops of their shake-shingled house. I planted a pink one, but I know no matter how I try to amend the soil, by next year it will be blue.

For two years after my sister Nancy died, I tried to find a pale, pale pink rose bush to plant in her honor. I also bought a pair of white metal angel wings to hang on the wall behind it. I was overjoyed when I finally found a beautiful climber, but when it bloomed, I was disappointed with sad white roses.

I lost my only aunt, Helen, last year, so I chose a peony to honor her. She had glorious gardens and always tended lush peonies. Even in her advanced years, she would text me a picture when they bloomed.

I plant petunias, a butterfly bush, and anything else that will attract hummingbirds—for Jim. Summer phlox makes me think of the perennials in Hartfield. Lantana reminds me of the Chester house. Blue iris for my childhood home.

Summer Phlox

The year we left that Chester house and moved to an apartment, I gave a giant potted chive to Nancy. I had tended it for several years. After we lost her, her partner Ray texted me a picture of the chives when they bloomed the following year. When he did, I started a new pot. Not that I even use them that much, but now it makes me think of Ray, and I smile.

Everywhere I’ve lived since leaving Buffalo, I tried to grow lilac bushes, but they never did well. The smell of lilacs in my grandmother’s backyard was something I wanted to recreate but was never able to. I gave up on lilacs with the move to Alabama—I knew I’d have no luck. One day I did find a sample-sized bottle of lilac-scented hand lotion at Ulta. I never use it, but every once in a while I open it, close my eyes, and take a deep breath.

Lantana

I’ve had plants fail. The colors weren’t right, the soil was wrong, the blooms never came. And still, every spring, I find myself planting again. Not just for beauty, but for memory—for connection. For the people I’ve loved and the places I’ve lived. Maybe that’s what gardening really is: not mastery, but devotion. A quiet promise to keep tending, even when things don’t grow the way we hoped.

Here's to a colorful summer,

V.