SRH gardening volume 1

Here's what my daughters call "my inspo"

This what I'd LOVE for the front of the house on either side of the new driveway. Of course I'll never stick to such a considered-looking palette, but I love the rocks and flowers.

These four images are from a rock garden in MA.

Crappy image, but I like the grasses along the steps.
(I'm NOT a native grasses girl)
I also like the railroad tie stairs.

So here's my "gessoed canvas"...the google image is what it looked like before we got all the scrubby plants off of the rocks.

People keep telling me I need to do "before and after" images of the transformation of the property. I dropped the ball on the "before" ones. Tim will probably have some, but I don't want to ask him because he's spent the past 4 days drilling 3 foot holes into the ledge and then pouring in some sort of bentonite mixture that's supposed to magically expand and crack the ledge open without blasting or drilling. He's been doing this on top of the usual cooking, ballerina schlepping, and a heavy workload.

The magical ledge splitting has yet to happen. He's grumpy.

I've spent hours stressing about plants arriving before I have a place to put them. This is definitely going to happen. The site work/utilities are now slated to be done by the end of August. I have 800 plants arriving sometime around June 5. I'll figure something out. The Sea Street gardens are important. They will be the most public portion of the project. We hope that if we create an awe-inspiring geologic/horticultural oasis, we will dismantle the wrath of the neighbors. Also, the woman directly across from this huge bed is my age. Her husband died suddenly in his car in the Market Basket parking lot last year before the ambulance could come and help him. He died thinking that our project was going to exacerbate the flooding in their home. We hope that the gardens and French drains below them will  improve the swampy basement situation. In addition, I hope that the pepperbush, roses, little kim lilacs and lavender will make the street smell good from spring through September, which won't help the fact that she no longer has her husband, and her boys don't have their dad, but good smells improve things no matter how shitty they are.

I put the Amsonia that arrived 3 months too early down there because I had no choice, but I think it might add something aesthetically to the beds, so I'm happy about it. (if it survives)

Below are images of the plants I've put in.

Look how fluffy and yellow the Amsonia gets in the fall!!!

(I took this picture last summer to show my sister in law my mom's wild irises. On a Friday in January, it occurred to me that the guys were going to dig them all up on Monday. Weirdly, for January in New England, that weekend was mild. Susie must've made that happen from the beyond. I ripped up what irises I could locate and dumped them in a pile on the ramp mom built for her partner. I hope they weather that poor treatment and thrive on Sea Street.

I ordered plants from 3 places. One place has started shipping, so I had weird plants that needed homes. I leave for Philly on Thursday, so I needed them in the ground. I left one dogwood in a pot and put the other in the bed above the Sea Street bed. (It was slated to go in the "rain garden" which will not be happening anytime soon.)

The "dogwood, sweet william, thyme bed" is above the street, so if all of those attempts die, no one will see my fail. (The images below are just to remind me where I stuck two Hellebore that arrived too soon for the rain garden. I also planted an anemone under mom's old lilac which I'll probably forget about)

Mom's irises did GREAT!

Update: most of the perennials I planted on Sea Street are doing OK, but I wanted things to look good this summer while they are establishing, so I threw in some canna bulbs and sunflower, cosmos, zinnia, and marigold seeds....so glad I did!

I even made a little garden for our neighbor. (She hired a lawyer to try and take this portion of our land right after my mom died, which was crappy of her, but I'm trying to rise above it botanically)

I get a lot of positive feedback while I'm gardening which is nice...people send me pics like this:

My brother's family came to visit while the construction was in full swing. My niece did these drawings:

"No more 'over the fence' chats or communal potlucks!"

"Proven to aggravate the victim complex"

"Drive them to lunacy with minimal effort and GREAT expense!"

We're not TRYING to bother people. We are trying to build and garden. It has taken so much more time than we thought and created so much more noise and dust than we'd expected. We are sorry.

This is the back of the NIMBY float that was in the 4th of July parade. There's a faction of people in Manchester who want zero development. They call themselves "Manchester Matters," which seems to compare density issues in a 5300-person, wealthy seaside town to getting bludgeoned to death during a routine traffic stop. I find that to be in poor taste, at best. The float was about rejecting the Massachusetts state mandate to provide more housing density near our train station. The side panel said "We're Manchester-by-the-Sea, not Manchester-by-the-transit." 

 

Robin and Doug (not to be confused with Robin and William)

Doug spotted a seascape on Robin's cup
Do you see the surf, the beach, the ocean and the sky?

Doug's mug doesn't have one.
He insists he loves it anyway.

I want to start using these sorts of images as fodder for writing more regularly, so if you have any pottery images or cuptastrophe stories, send them my way. Robin and Doug texted the above images to show the "cups that won" being loved and used in their new home. Robin and Doug always take a while to make final choices when they come over to peruse the disorganized jumble of pottery that is strewn around my house. They haven't ever come shopping together, but they have similar shopping styles. There's a process of elimination that happens when indecisive people buy pottery; it's fun for them, but also seems to elicit a feeling of awkwardness; like they need to apologize for the pottery they don't buy.  

Robin and Doug are new friends in Manchester-by-the-Sea. Robin is a painter and Doug is a doctor. I met Robin hiking on the trails at Ravenswood when Leo was still a puppy. Like Robin and me, Leo and her labradoodle, Levi, are now great friends. It's hard making new friends in your 50s. Once you do, it's hard getting past the surface, infancy level of a friendship. Alcohol helps, but there's an intrinsic kinship that has to be there as well. Maybe it's that our foursome combines all of the astrological elements. Tim and I are earth and fire. Robin and Doug are air and water. We balance each other, or maybe we just crack each other up.

Robin swears this is Levi, but
I believe Leo has become her muse.

Robin showed me a video she and Doug had put together in a storm. He's approaching her on his bike. There's debris all over the road. He's wearing his mirrored helmet and a neon rain jacket. As he zooms by her, we see that he's rigged his bike with a battery-powered leaf blower. In the last clip of the film, the speed limit sign flashes a rebuke because Doug, with his extra power, has exceeded the speed limit. How could we not be friends with a couple who spent an hour in the rain making and remaking that film????

More Robin paintings:

When she moved, my mother in law gave me some of her peony bulbs.

She still laments not taking ALL of her peonies when she left PA for NJ.

When JP arrived on Mother's Day, I got bouquets of peonies.

Dad used to cut up cantelope for me.

He and I were the only ones who love it.

I know my mom would have loved this one

On a street in Ipswich

Outside her show at Zumi,

Robin and I photographed her work

to post on her blog

We might have a show together.

There's definitely some color compatibility

The monotony of February in New England calls for absurdity. The four of us recently spent an entire meal speaking in fake accents, predominately Northern Irish and Southern US. I thought it might be getting old, but when I reverted to my normal voice, I was booed. We came to the conclusion that people should have all delicate conversations in fake accents; it takes the edge off. One of my college roommates put "fluent in fake Chinese" at the bottom of her resume. I wonder if she's maintained her fluency or if it's disappeared in a PC rebranding. Imagine if Biden assigned Netanyahu a South Carolina accent and whoever is negotiating for the Gazans had to speak like Shrek? Maybe they'd get somewhere. 

Doug is a woodworker as well as a doctor. Robin is a potter as well as a painter. Robin and Doug had to deal with grumpy neighbors and zoning issues when they built their gorgeous garage/studio. We bonded over this because our neighbors are against any changes we've proposed to my mom's property. Robin lets me fire pottery in her kiln whenever I'm in a pinch. She offered this so soon in our relationship; it might have hindered our becoming friends. That's an odd thing to say, but I could see myself thinking, "I don't want to have them over because then they'll think I just want to use the kiln." Actually, I can't see normal Liz Kinder thinking that way, but the Liz Kinder whom Robin met on the trails of Ravenswood had just been clobbered socially. 

My mother had recently died. We moved to Manchester-by-the-Sea to grieve, to deal with her property and to give the kids a small town public school experience. Tim and I gave our neighbors drawings and plans describing the project we hoped to construct on my mom's 2-acre lot. We told them all to come and talk to us about it if they had any questions or concerns. Two supported us. One came to us with a concern that we resolved, and the rest signed a 5-page letter to the town denouncing our plans. Their first assertion was that Tim and I had been "underhanded." 

The couple next door have been a huge part of my life. Mom and Penny co-parented their combined 5 offspring. I was in two of their  daughters' weddings. The male half, who has been like a father to me (albeit a leering, lecherous one) has told his wife, Penny, that Tim and I are no longer welcome in their home because Tim and I want to build a house that he will not see from his own.  Penny is 82 and has to hobble through the woods to our house whenever we want to have coffee or a beer together. Another neighbor is our town moderator. He greets us with smiles whenever our dogs stop to sniff each other's asses. It's disorienting as we know he's doing everything in his power to stop us from building on our property.

It's been 2.5 years. Tim and I are going ahead with building what we can without special permits. I have been pouring over native plant catalogues. We are hoping to turn my mom's neglected, scrubby lot into a gorgeous, native plant oasis, and we will build a studio for me and a shop for Tim. We've employed Ray and Dan to do the excavation and masonry. Tim's dad, Jack, always said he could "pick someone's teeth with his backhoe." Jack would approve of Ray and Dan. Their craftsmanship is stunning. The new retaining walls look like part of the ledge, like they've always been there.

A few months after my mom died, the immediate neighbor on the other side threatened to sue us for "adverse possession." She didn't have a case, but she had a lawyer tell us to give her a 10'x50' piece of land and a 5'x90' chunk because we'd taken trees down on our property and "devalued" hers. The "good fences make good neighbors" wall now separates our properties. It's not a great picture. The wall is gorgeous.

"good fences make good neighbors"

She called the police when Dan was placing stones. She had them tell Dan not to stand on her side to place any rocks. The wall is taking a right turn this week. (The property line is odd.) Rather than rely on the police, she decided to place cinder blocks along the property line to remind Dan that he cannot step beyond our lot. She's a small woman, almost exactly my age. It feels like we're siblings sharing a bed, and she's making sure to kick me if my foot crosses onto her side. Ray and Dan are used to this stuff. Apparently it happens all the time. I wonder how long those blocks will remain after the wall is built. Did I mention the woman is a child psychologist?

🙌 🙌 🙌 🙌

With its beach, harbor and woodland trails, the beauty of Manchester-by-the-Sea is undeniable. People drawn to it are in some ways, "my people" in that they are aesthetically-oriented, but there's a divide. There are a group of people who believe that ANY changes will ruin the place. They approach town meetings with a white-knuckled NIMBYism that is baffling and sad. The other half see that the town can maintain its beauty and incorporate urban planning, infrastructure updates, and new housing.

Another neighbor fumed on Facebook about our project. They are going to manufacture pottery and run an architecture firm, and our street is zoned residential! This woman, too, is my age. Our kids are similar ages. She likes dogs. We are both named, Elizabeth. In some other world, I'm sure we would be friends. All along, she's been manufacturing dinners and running her life, blissfully ignorant of the ceramic and green building horrors happening in her midst. The head of zoning got involved in the Facebook tirade and explained that what we are doing complies with the town's bylaws. I limited my participation to a single 👍 when a friend cut through the speculation to explain our plans.

For the first time ever on the Friday after her Tuesday FB rant, I received the other Elizabeth's mail. Tim and I had gone out for lunch. We rarely do this because I always have a crisper filled with produce that I don't want to waste, and if I get a salad at a restaurant, and the lettuce hasn't been washed properly, I turn into a toddler. (I have, by the way, broken up with Trader Joe's produce. We've been on the rocks for the while. Mushy Persian cucumbers finally ended it.) I had on a cute outfit and make-up. I also had the perfect amount of "liquid courage," as we'd splurged and had beers. So when Tim suggested I ring her doorbell and ask her if she'd like to talk, rather than furtively shove her package in her mailbox, I stomped up there and did just that.

Initially I received a polite, "thanks" when I handed her the package.  She seemed to be optimistically assuming that "what happens on Facebook stays on Facebook," like those t-shirts with the cursive font: "What happens at Grandma's stays at Grandmas." When I asked, "I saw your Facebook posts, would you like to have a conversation?" she responded, "I have a fever." I said, "Oh! I'm sorry! Would you like to have a conversation another time?" She glared at me and said, "Maybe." The sun caught her eyes right before the door hid her from view. Being dismissive and cowardly really brings out their beautiful, earthy shade of amber green. 

My father's lament about Manchester was that no one ever knew when he was kidding or not. I had always felt slightly out-of-step socially as well. I hid my discomfort by excelling at sports. When I finally left the east coast and moved to San Francisco, all of my friends were makers. Helping two of them paint their rent-controlled apartment meant gleefully blowing holographic glitter onto the drying Ralph Lauren metallic paint. One room was raspberry, one gold, and the halls were silver. I met similar people in London and Philly. London, because I was in art school. Philly, because it's so cheap, creatives can afford to live there. In the summers, when I would come back to Manchester, I no longer had a lacrosse stick to hide behind, but I was mature enough to revel in the skepticism that my dyed hair and nebulous income stream fostered. I laughed out loud when anyone suggested I move "home."

Our kids are thriving in Manchester. For that I am grateful. Sometimes I worry that my girls' creativity is being squelched. When their friends come over, a seal-like pile of tastefully-made-up, crap-eating teenagers mounds on our couches. It's hard to pick out which one is mine in the slender, long-haired, supine mass of grey sweats and Uggs. The only time I see any sort of color is when summer comes and their tiny asses peek out of neon bikinis. Poor Tim is  tortured by the lack of real estate in those bathing suits. We see the parents of these other children when they drop them off or pick them up but have not made friendships with any. 

I entitled this blog post, "Robin and Doug-not to be confused with Robin and William." Above is my initial stab at a set of plates for Robin and William. We had our first meeting about their new dishes on zoom. We went through a Robin-curated group of old images of my work and each would chime in when a color or pattern appealed. The two of them had completely different tastes. The order was 8 bowls, 8 salad plates, and 8 dinner plates. The lack of direction was daunting but sort of comically freeing. I figured a couple of the plates in my first pass would inspire them, and we'd go from there. I eventually sell leftovers on my website or at farmers' markets, so I don't stress about having extras.

After presenting my first attempt to Robin and William, they loved all of the bowls and most of the plates. I was only 3 plates shy of completing the entire set. Clay absorbs the joy I feel when I'm working, and I'd been having a blast so I understand why Robin and William loved the results. BUT, they hadn't picked any of the plates that had really enthralled me, the combination I now call "Robin and William." 

I kept a "Robin/William" plate.

Robin and Doug raise chickens, 

and give us the most delicious eggs

(Yes, that is jalapeno pub cheese on green beans)

Why did I name the combination they didn't like after them? When Robin came to pick up the 3 stragglers, she told me they'd decided to spring for cups as well. Still smitten with my new glaze combo, I had made a bunch of cups in the "Robin and William" glazes. The cups were marching on a thin shelf along the stairs in my Philly studio. Robin said, "Oh wow! look at those! Maybe we'll just take all of them!" It cracked me up.

 

Their union emulates the name the fabulous Robin Williams, and they are the first Gemini/Scorpio couple I've ever met. Now their names are a glaze combo. Erica Jacobs, an amazing cook who posts unbearable Facebook pictures of her mouthwatering meals, has a bowl named after her.  (She probably has more of my pottery than I do.) The 'erica bowl' is shallow with a wide rim that frames her gorgeous soups. My friend, Andrew, likes a short cappuccino cup. I rarely make them, but he's broken every one I've made him, so now when I have to make a replacement, my "to do" list says "Andrew cup." 

My friend, Cats ordered the sink below. She wanted her sink to be "more of a Duke blue than a UNC blue." That still makes me laugh, but I haven't started calling that glaze "Duke blue." However, Cat's Darlington, SC accent is the source of my southern accent at dinner parties.