The Natural Way

I am on vacation. It is the first week of June (2009) and I was hoping (as always) for a beautiful week off. I am locked away in an office building NYC during the day job and the opportunity to be out of doors is precious to me.

For the first four days things were OK. So-so. A couple of incredibly gorgeous days, but also those late PM thunderstorms and showers. Today has been the least pleasant day and, following some showers, a cold front has moved through and things are a bit grey and chilly.

But I've been enjoying myself, nonetheless. The rain has alleviated the need for me to drag my hose around watering and after a burst of creative gardening energy yesterday, I managed to pull a muscle (or ten) in my lower back and today was restricted to chair-duty.

I was, however, able to walk around and look at the progress I've made so far. Some delightfully arranged terra cotta pots with begonias and impatiens (complimentary shades) that have been lined up on an old bench. The collections of my vegetables - tomatoes, basil, parsely, herbs, hot peppers - that are all awaiting the return of my physical vigor in order to plant them. I looked into different nooks and crannies and was inspired by the delight of the riotously self-sowing Siebolda Elegans hostas. I can dig up several extras and plant them along the stark white plastic fence my neighbors have erected - in place of the 60 year old everygreen hedge. I have some daylilies to move from the now-darkened corners (see fence comment above) to new homes where they'll thrive. And, of course, I have excess William Baffin suckers, odd little dogwood shoots, and numerous extra bishops' weed plants that can be put to good use in other areas.

But after I did my wandering, I had to sit down with some old gardening magazines which I promised to go through in order to get rid of as many as possible (what do you mean you don't have house and garden magazines from 1988 in your house?). In my favorite chair - the bargain of the century, my $14.00 plastic Adirondack chair that is perfection in my garden - so much so that I have 10 of them in assorted colors including hot pink - I grabbed a stack of magazines and went to work.

From the English gardens to the Southwestern US spaces; exotic Florida gardens and a wealth of Northeastern vegetable operations, I persued gardens, gardeners, ideas, plants, and studied the amazing photographs that accompanied these stories. Chefs with kitchen gardens, writers with herb gardens, artists with knot gardens and authors with gardens comprised of Shakespeare-named roses.

And what I gained (in addition to a redweld filled with tear-sheets of things I cannot bear to part with) is a wealth of inspiration.

As a writer with a (some say excessively fervent) imagination, I can recognize the perfect house and garden for my lingerie designer as she escapes from her urban existence. For the scrappy pastry chef who yearns for her own restaurant - the perfect herb garden and messy potting shed. The perfectly set table with fresh vegetables and flowers that says "home" to the bad girl who dares to go home again.

Fresh air and the succor of my natural "writer's space" are paramount to me. I can slough off the exhaustion and frustration that a stifling day job and commuting and crowds and the worries of life heap upon me. I can stretch out my legs with bare feet that feel the tickle of the pachysandra and the cool chill of damp bricks. I can breath in fresh air, and feel a cool breeze upon my face. Watch the leaves far above my sway on the branches of my sycamore tree. See the squirrels, bumble bees, feral cats and odd insects as they go about their daily business in the oasis I have created.

An oasis that feeds me, spiritually and creatively, just as it feeds them.

Find your own writer's space and trust me, if you can instill an element of nature, of green, of life, into that space .... it will be that much more inspiring. Allow yourself to wallow in Mother Nature's own remedy for stress, strain, and anxiety. Spend some time in nature.