The Abbey Garden

So I had a baby, and a few weeks later, had a garden. The former event definitely eclisped the latter, which is why it is only now, two months later, that I am remembering to post about it. Our church's coffeehouse, The Abbey, is now approaching its first birthday, and the year has been good. I have been so impressed by the incomparable genius of Sara Peterson, The Abbey's manager, design maven, and barista champion.
The adjacent courtyard seating area took a bit longer-there were a few minor setbacks. Let it be said that if you are trying to get the county's ear, just build a wall without a permit and stand back. But that's all in the past now, and the courtyard looks lovely. It's a little more shabby chic than I would have done. It's hard to imagine a shabby chic monastic garden, but somehow I think it works-only in California!
So here are some pics of the garden, which opened with much acclaim and pancakes on June 6th.

I am happy with the design over all, and since it is a work in progress (which is a good definition of a garden, I think) I will not kick myself too hard for the things that I would have done differently. Although come winter, I will practive the fine art of Ultimate Pruning i.e. Hoik & Toss. Things to be hoiked include: the dirt in the pic above, cleverly disguised with mulch as garden soil, but actually terrible fill dirt. I meant for this planter (5' x 2') to only have a thin layer of the free-from-Craig's-List fill dirt, but with the volunteer help it was about 3/4 fill and 1/4 potting soil/compost. I was too pregnant to lift a shovel to fix it, so we just planted and held our breath. As a result the plants are pretty sickly looking-the lemon verbena, usually a rangy, ungangly (though fragrant) addition to the garden, is now sporting yellow leaves and almost no new growth. The rest of the plants look anemic and not long for this world. The first rule in organic gardening is to look after the soil, and the soil will look after the plants. In other words, healthy soil equals healthy plants. So I forgot this rule. Just don't tell them up at UCSC's Farm & Garden, or they'll take away my certificate.....

I still haven't got ahold of a few of the plants I've had in mind for this garden, namely; Angelica Archangelica, and biblical hyssop (not hyssop officianalis, as it turns out, but origanum syriacus). I've gone through two verbascum bombyciferum 'Arctic Summer' plants, which is a shame, since this is such a great plant.

I have really loved doing this design, getting to work with amazing people like Bruce & Claudia, The Abbey staff, and all the other Abbey Gardeners out there (you know who you are!)

Current Happy Things

audio
1.Welcome to the Welcome Wagon by the Welcome Wagon
gastronomy
2.lime popsicles
film
3.Harry Potter & the Half Blood Prince (B wants to see it in 3D. I am unsure. I'm afraid it will bring back too many Captain Eo memories...)
book
Great Expectations The thing that really tickles me about reading Great Expectations, besides that it is unexpectedly funny, is that I am unable to maintain any amount of internal smugness upon reading a 'classic'; Dickens wrote it as a serial in a newspaper. It's like feeling snooty for reading 'Prince Valiant' or 'Rex Morgan, MD'. When you consider that most of Dickens' works were published in this manner, as serial pieces for the masses, you can't help but think that despite what we've gained since that time (where to begin?!) we have become decidedly less literate as a culture. (McSweeney's not withstanding!) Here's a nod to a new online mag that is turning the tide: Content. Check them out and tell them Rosa sent you!

Rosa's Indie Short Film Archives: Souvenirs & Shiny Things by Annie Quick

I have never been so thankful for the volunteers in my garden; they are almost completely carrying the show-thanks to some eye-catching rose campion (lychnis coronaria) and the lovely contrasting chartreuse blooms of the euphorbia. Add to it the jasmine in bloom, purple veronica 'Chadwick Especial', and some tall weedy-looking white daisies and orange California poppies; these make up the majority of what's in bloom in the garden. I haven't figured out how to nurse and garden at the same time (probably a good thing) so any flowers that come up are there of their own instigation, as I can do little but move the sprinkler around.
Over in hydrangea corner, in all that delicious acidic soil, the deep blue and purple blooms are just lovely, as is the sky seen through the twisted and outstretched branches of the scrub oaks. I find myself outside often, on the porch with a baby, watching the trees: elder, oak, bay, madrone and redwood wave lazily in the light June breeze. It's been lovely. And helps to remind me why we live here, besides the fantastic rent, and the friendly neighborhood.

I need all the help I can get lately, when most things in our house feel cramped, broken, and in need of a paint job. I think I might be ready to live in a larger house (we've got about 800 square feet, the kind of place which feels bigger if we all suck our stomachs in), but meanwhile I'm trying to be grateful for what I have. I desperately want that sense of contentment that belies my surroundings, I think it might have something to do cultivating the inner life. I've just started Teresa of Avila's 'The Interior Castle'; we'll see what she has to say about it.
Bats!
Meanwhile, I have a weird ear infection-it doesn't hurt, but my left ear is totally full and I feel like I'm on an airplane. It's hard to hear and I've got that odd cocoon-like feeling all the time, sort of in my own world because I can't hear everything. Add to it the constant state of sleep deprivation that I live in, and you get a sort of spaced-out, vaguely smiling at everyone, prematurely batty version of myself. I'm beginning to feel like I belong in some sort of home, or at least in a rocker on a veranda, reminiscing about the olden days. Stop me before I start calling everyone 'honey' and collecting stray cats. Maybe I need some meds?

Radical Nature: Art and Architecture for a Changing Planet

Is anyone going to be in London this summer? Stop by Kew Gardens and think of me and then head over to the Barbican Gallery for their summer offering: 'Radical Nature: Art & Architecture for a Changing Planet 1969-2009'. It looks like a great show, really interesting stuff. I love Agnes Denes' exhibit: Wheatfield-A Confrontation, 1982. The wheat fields were planted and harvested in the Battery Park Landfill, Manhattan.

This show is a retrospective, so B's bosses, Helen Mayer Harrison and Newton Harrison- forerunners of the ecological art movement-were asked to include a piece that was originally exhibited in 1974. The piece is called 'Full Farm', which basically consists of raised beds and grow-lights in a gallery setting; which I think was cutting edge technology in 1974. Now it just looks like the museum staff have a little indoor allotment.

I bring this bit up because somehow, in the haze that followed giving birth, I agreed to design the plantings for this piece. Which sounds like over-commitment when I can hardly manage to dress myself before noon, but it seemed like fun at the time. Honestly, I can hardly recall what I put in each raised bed, but I think I did add some English wild spinach, chenopodiom bonus-henricus, in honor of our new little sprout, (common name, Good King Henry). I have no idea if this is commonly cultivated in the UK; I figured in London it might be considered a posh menu item, in a similar vein with California's dandelion greens, the edible variety of which is more of a wild chicory than what is usually seen gracing America's lawns. And what an awkward sentence, sorry. Anyway, do stop by the Barbican and graze on my design. Special prize offer for the first to send me pics!

It feels a little anti-climactic, my garden design debut at a London gallery, but who knows.....next year-Chelsea?

I don't seem to have two minutes to rub together. But somehow I have plenty of time to sit around and read. How could this be? Oh yes, I am nursing a newborn. I have plowed through a small library's worth of books in the last six weeks, and am constantly scanning the horizon, looking for a new read. I've nursed my way through all my favorite comfort reads: the Chronicles of Narnia, Lord of the Rings, Dorothy Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries, Jan Karon's Mitford novels and I just finished the last of the Harry Potter series. Okay, so actually some of these I read right at the end of the pregnancy. I read fast but not that fast.
Appeal to the Bookish
So does anyone have any other books to suggest? I'm plowing steadily through Madeline L'Engle's 'A Swiftly Tilting Planet', and Thomas Howard's very groovy 'Christ the Tiger'. I think I want some more fiction, as my very tired brain probably cannot keep up with much more than a good story. But not that Shack book, or anything by Dan Brown. Oh, and if Oprah recommends it, or you read it at your book club, the odds are good that I don't want to read it. But I don't want to be picky....

Living La Vida Loca

I'd say mostly it's good, actually mostly it's been great, these last 6 weeks of life with our new little guy. But then there are those days when my brains feel like mush, the mental equivalent of watching reality TV shows featuring the rich and whiny, eating Cheetos and swilling Dr. Pepper. And I can't seem to manage showering, teeth brushing and donning clean clothes, all in the same day. Let alone find time to blog, garden, call people back, or any myriad of things that I used to do with ease (except call people back, I never do that with ease.)
My World Measured in Square Footage
I forgot just how stymieing it feels, life with a newborn; tethered to the couch as I nurse and nurse. My world feels like it is shrinking down into the size of my home, as I spend so much time in it. And since my house is only 700 square feet or so, my world feels very small indeed.
I need grace for this time, which I already knew would be hard. But I forgot what kind of hard it is. Because in the midst of the hardness, the crying, the diapering, the sleepless nights, it becomes very hard to remember that this isn't my new reality for the rest of my days and that having two children won't always feel like this toiling procession through the Land of Needs.
Reeds and Wicks
So H.O. and G both are sick, and last Friday night we were down in Steinbecktown staying over with the in-laws. Little H.O. stayed up most of the night: snarfy, coughing and crying, poor little guy. And I stayed up with him, nursing and reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. As I lay there, in the wee hours, I felt such crushing exhaustion and something like despair. "Oh Jesus, help me." I whispered into the night.
And what rushed in was a half remembered bit of Scripture from Isaiah 55, a description of the Messiah, "A bruised reed he will not break and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out."
It's a fairly accurate depiction of how I felt, actually. Like a reed that someone had tried to sever, left bent, twisted, unable to sway in the breeze. Or a guttering wick that is little more than a faint tendril of smoke. Jesus looks at these reeds and wicks tenderly, does nothing that would harm them any further and nurtures whatever life is left there. He looks at me and doesn't judge me, or tell me to just suck it up and get on with life. He reaches down with divine restoration in his hand and I trust that he will mend and heal where I've been bent, that he will strike the match that will relight this wick. I wait and hope.
"He tends his flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those that have young." Isaiah 4o:11

In Which I Have A Spinal Headache

Caveat: Not for the Squeamish
So apparently if you have a spinal block put in really really fast, sometimes the little hole in your spinal column doesn't close properly. And if this happens, a little bit of spinal fluid will drip out. And when it does, because it is a pressurized system, when you sit up, your brain flops down a little bit and you get the killer headache of the century. And if you then try to get out of bed and do something wild like, say, eat food-it will most likely come back up with a vengeance. So that was me, for 4 of the 5 days I was in there.
On the afternoon of day 4, after B had gone home to look after G, the docs figured out that I had what is known as a spinal headache. And the solution was to take a bit of my own blood and insert it in the hole in my spinal column which would then clot and fill up the hole. I know. I could hardly listen to him describe the procedure without retching. I've always been squeamish about anything having to do with my spine. The real reason I delivered G without any pain medication is because I was too freaked out by the description of the epidural-("a shunt? In my spine? Aack!") So I had to decide, right then, if I wanted this procedure done to me. I agreed, reluctantly. The anaesthesiologist skipped blithely off to prepare the room.
And all at once I was overwhelmed with the feeling of being totally alone in the hospital with my baby, about to undergo a procedure that would probably leave me paralysed. I tried to call B but he didn't answer. I tried to call my mom. Same. I started to get teary.
The nurse came in and tried to talk me down. I remember really wanting her to take my hand and hold it, but she was all bustling efficiency, and there's probably rules about hand-holding.
And just then, my mom walked in.
"Mom! I'm so glad you're here! I need to have another procedure done!"
"I had a feeling that I should come see you now, instead of after I get my errands done," she said. She came over, took my hand, and started to pray over me.
This evidence of God's interjection into my fearful, dark little moment calmed me almost immediately. She held little H.O. and I got onto a gurney.
Recovery
After 4 hours flat on my back (reading Sayers' Murder Must Advertise), I popped out of bed, put on my robe and started walking. I left mom with H.O. and went visiting next door: friends who had just delivered that morning. And I haven't looked back. Thanks, little blood clot!