I started junking only about 10 years ago, and mostly because I needed a new hobby. My first love was gardening, but I had gardened so enthusiastically that I kind of wrecked my back, and my body needed a break. (Also several rounds of steroid injections, but nobody wants to hear about that.) It took a few years to get back into shoveling and raking form, and once I was, I faced a conflict. Should I junk, or should I garden? This season, I haven't faced that conflict at all. The only sales I've gone to are ones I happened to pass on the way to a greenhouse. All I want to do is garden.
Here's the view out my bedroom window. It's the herb bed, the first thing I look at when I get out of bed. I took this photo (dangling out an open window) about 10 days ago, and I think everything has doubled in size since then.
But it's come a long way from a month ago. (I can't believe that was only a month ago. I think this is why gardening can be so great.)
The frigid weather last winter had a peculiar effect all around our property. Some plants that seemed indestructible, like lemon balm, died off. Other plants, like some annual dianthus that shouldn't have come back, are lush with second-year growth.
Okay, maybe this is why gardening is so great.
Some of the hardy geraniums came back. Some of them didn't. At any rate, the hit-and-miss destruction required overhauling lots of beds, and that was awesome. A chance to correct previous mistakes, as well as a chance to make new ones.
The chamomile seeded itself. Instead of having enough for one cup of tea, I may have enough for two cups of tea this year.
Feverfew is a self-sower, too. I bought one packet of seeds back in my old days of gardening, and I've never needed to buy it again. I love enthusiasm! I love free plants!
This is the first time I've grown this - Centella asiatica, or gotu kola. Apparently it cures everything and can be eaten as a salad green. I bought it because it fit my requirements and it was pretty.
I've always liked going to greenhouses, not just for the plants, but for the ideas. At one greenhouse I saw a wooden box planted with herbs, and I liked it so much I checked the price tag, and thankfully, because I think it was about $75, I remembered I had a wooden box! And herbs! So for the price of a bag of potting soil, I had pretty much the same thing.
The box (it's a shipping crate for encyclopedias) came from the basement of our first house, and I have hauled it to several locations because I was so certain it would come in handy someday. As it did. There may not be as much junk this summer, but certainly, there will be junk. And lots of projects. It will be, I think, a before-and-after summer, and I'm really looking forward to it.
