Garden 2: the Neighbours'

Mock orange, front door, welcome mat

"Life is demarcated by its transitory nature."

My neighbour said this to me one year ago, departing my house by the back door for the very last time. Ain't that the truth.

From a home to a health hazard, just like that

I know when they bought the house they intended to stay. The first time we met, on a playdate at the park, brokered by him (with whom in the alley, a day or two before, I had had a brief and cordial discussion about composting), she told me she wanted to be the kind of neighbour you could call up to borrow a cup of sugar. I liked her instantly. Not just sugar, either, but food colouring, ice, gin, wheelbarrow...

One last look at our house from their deck. Our shingles don't match...

We became friends and neighbours, not just friendly neighbours. Our youngest occasionally played ninjas together. Our oldest were usually civil. Good enough. They included us when they entertained. I watered their garden and fed their cat when they were away. We had each other's house keys, alarm codes, and - most coveted - sitter's contact information.

Morning glory

We were careful not to overstep each other's boundaries, but the gate to the back garden was always unlocked (she kept kale plants there, mostly for me) and the welcome mat at their sliding kitchen doors was always out. They were the kind of neighbours you could visit in your pyjamas. And he mixed a mean, well-edited selection of cocktails.

Carpet underlay should be felt and not seen

I'm not always great with life's transitory nature. Good or bad, I seem to need more than the standard amount of time to process change. So, demolition underway, I find myself drawn back to my ex-neighbours' ex-house, for one last look and a souvenir snapshot. I think they might appreciate an update and a picture of the mess.

Soon the diggers roll in

They are an important part of the history of that little purple house (blue, actually, but it was their house; they can call it what they like). They are its last family. That their leaving would likely mean the end for the house, too, must have made the decision doubly hard. Though they hoped to attract a family that would love it the way they did, the house is old, small, and quirky. Development was inevitable.

Unlike me, she had no issue with buttercup

Standing in the overgrown riot of raspberry, roses, weeds and rubble, my attention begins to focus. That is not just broken wainscoting; it is the orange-red trim from their kitchen. That's not just a mess of gutted cabinets, but the lazy Susan that once held their casserole dishes. There's the cupboard with tea, crackers and cat treats. I spent many hours in that kitchen, watching her decorate her secret-family-recipe Shortbread Nut Sticks with melted chocolate and a toothpick. I know it well. I'm not looking at any old half-demolished house; this is their half-demolished house.

She gave me this euphorbia 3 years ago.
I think his old bike will feel at home here.

I see him, flipper in hand, hovering near the BBQ on the back deck, Canadian flag hanging above him. I see her annual Christmas party spread: apple cider on the stove, a crockpot of meatballs on the table, platters of bacon-wrapped dates, chicken wings, cheese and home baking on the metal coffee table. I see the children in their Hallowe'en costumes, made of cardboard, imagination and love.

I glance past the piles of broken drywall, fibre-board and counter top, and notice the tangled, jungly remains of what used to be their vegetable garden. The morning glory, as she knew it would, has won. In three days the house, and the garden, will be gone. Soon enough another house - new, comfortable, efficient - will exist in its place. Wonder if the new neighbours will be the kind you can call up to borrow a cup of sugar.

Garden 14:  Harvest
Garden 13: Abandoned Stuff, Things of Beauty
Garden 12: Death and Potential
Garden 11: Japanese Maple Tree and Sedum (?)
Garden 10: Foxglove and Weed Digger
Garden 9: Veggies and Sweet Pea 
Garden 8: Gnomes and Slugs
Garden 7: The Lady Next Door
Garden 6: Euphorbia and Rusted, Metal Things
Garden 5: Cement Bench and Wallflower
Garden 4: Maryjane
Garden 3: Family Portrait
Garden 1: Lilac Bush and Abandoned Cans

Garden 1: Lilac Bush and Abandoned Cans

Cans hanging in the lilac bush are a sort of penitence

There were three healthy, mature lilacs growing along the East garden fence when we moved into our old-timer house in 1998. The only lilac I had ever known to that point, which lived in our back yard in Kamloops, was a bush, not a tree, and the flowers, being at nose height, were easily enjoyed. In a mistaken attempt to return the flowers of my tree to where they belonged - where I could smell them - I had a friend saw all three trees down to one-foot-high stumps. I shudder when I think of it. This lilac bush is the only one to survive. For 17 years I've been trying to correct that lamentable mistake, one of my very first acts as a gardener. I don't remember what promted me to hang the first of a growing collection of no-longer-useable, abandoned watering (and other) cans from the branches. The "installation" just sort of happened. The cans distract from the awkward, ugly stump and the badly-pruned branches shooting out the top. I rather like the bush as it is now, especially with the volunteer ferns that help hide the unsightly stump, but I definitely regret giving the order that day.

A house-warming gift from Mr. Renwick

Cheapola, abused Ikea can

Doronicum, from a soon-to-be-bulldozed garden.
I like the spent flower heads.

Isn't this green one a beauty?
The other was found in the parking lot
adjacent the Chemainus Theatre on Vancouver Island

I look forward to my lilac blooming around Mother's Day each year. The flowers are white, large, and especially heavenly-smelling at 7 PM. Most years I bring in a big bouquet, which sits elegantly on the back of the toilet, giving off a fantastic scent that fills the house, until I get tired of picking the fallen florets out of my Phentex slippers, and eventually chuck the lot in the yard waste container.

At some point in the summer I will haul out the aluminium ladder - a gift for my husband that I really bought for myself - and snap off the dried-up flower heads. Pruning is on-going, as small stems are constantly budding out in all the wrong directions, and suckers periodically come up beside the stump. Furthermore, the bush is too close to the fence, and has power lines hanging above it, so there's always strategic branch removal happening. I've tried to encourage another lilac, a gift from a friend on a very sad occasion, to grow in other parts of the garden, but no luck. The rest of the yard is just too shady.

The first item to adorn the bush, an ancient, rusty paint can, was found in the rafters of the garage when we bought the house. There had been three other owners before us, including Mr. A. Renwick, house painter, and his family. I expect the can was his. Mr Renwick's touch is all over the house, and he took good care of it. The doors and door frames, though wood, he meticulously painted a different, more classy,  faux wood - a detail I've seen in some other houses of the same age in the neighbourbood. (I wonder, did he paint those houses, too?) I found the faux wood very... something, and with apologies to Mr. Renwick and the help of a can of Kilz Primer, which seems to stick to everything, including varnish, I had the trim painted over in glossy, candelabra white. I wonder what Mr. Renwick would say to that. The hours it must have taken him to painstakingly create that imitation wood grain... Later, at a yard sale in Southlands, I found a bedside table with identical, hand-painted, faux wood grain. I feel a little bit better about obliterating Mr. Renwick's careful work, having that piece of furniture to remind me what it used to look like.

The rest of the cans, milk jug and enamel-coated kettle appeared at various times, from alleys, garage sale "free" boxes, hand-me-downs, and Ikea. The Ikea watering can is the only one I paid for, bought shortly after we moved in. It wasn't long before the spout separated and the bottom dropped out - not to mention the handle getting crushed underfoot. (Aw, come on... watch where you're stepping!) Nowadays, there's nothing I want from Ikea, aside from gingersnaps, the occasional package of frozen meatballs, and a rare jar of lingonberry jam.

All the cans have holes, except for the red gas can, which is too sketchy-looking to use for gas, and was left behind in the neighbour's shed when they moved away. I think it had been there when they moved in, too. I felt like I was removing a precious artifact, but we were told the house would be demolished, and I wanted to make sure this gorgeous specimen wasn't demolished along with it.

Speaking of novice gardening mistakes, other biggies made around this time include: 

• removing the pear tree (it looked scabby) and; 
• digging out the evergreen shrubs hiding the less attractive portion of the front of the house. I used to have a thing against evergreen shrubs, though I can't remember what, exactly. They are serviceable, undemanding, and they smell good, too. I replaced these sensible workhorses with fussy, raised, matching flower beds on either side of the front steps, one of which, due to being right up against the plaster, caused the wall to buckle, and hastened the rotting of our wooden steps. It has since been replaced by three evergreen shrubs, much like the originals, found, half dead, dumped in a heap behind a house a block and a half away. I hauled the least dead of them home on my son's plastic, Fisher-Price baby wagon, a hand-me-down from a friend who has been extremely generous to me with her son's clothing and toys. I baby those shrubs with frequent, deep drinks from a barely trickling hose, and three years later, depending on the angle, they look much less dead.

Lesson learned: wait at least a year before making any changes to any newly acquired garden. It's hard to be patient, especially when you've just treated yourself to a new set of gardening gloves, a Costco-sized container of bone meal and a lovely, sharp set of garden shears, but it's worth it. Abandoned cans might hide a number of sins, but they can't bring back all the delicious pears we didn't eat these last 17 years.

Garden 14:  Harvest
Garden 13: Abandoned Stuff, Things of Beauty
Garden 12: Death and Potential
Garden 11: Japanese Maple Tree and Sedum (?)
Garden 10: Foxglove and Weed Digger
Garden 9: Veggies and Sweet Pea 
Garden 8: Gnomes and Slugs
Garden 7: The Lady Next Door
Garden 6: Euphorbia and Rusted, Metal Things
Garden 5: Cement Bench and Wallflower
Garden 4: Maryjane
Garden 3: Family Portrait
Garden 2: The Neighbours'