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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (May 6, 2011)
OREGON'S LGBTO NEWSMAGAZINE voices MAY 6. 2011 Gardening Visions & Letting It Be The garden I have now began 13 years ago, when my partner and I bought our Craftsman house in North Pordand’s Portsmouth neighbor hood and put down roots— literally. The house had been on a double lot, and what had been the garden would eventually, over the course of a year, become our neighbor’s house. Living next to a year of construction is not something I’d do again. But this first year gave me the opportunity to see how we traveled through the house, how the light shone on parts of the expansive lawn and where rain fell and puddled in areas around the house. I had big dreams. A garden full of blousy flowers, romantic scents and frosted with blooms. Green grass paths that wandered through a lush oasis, birds everywhere and space to play, entertain and relax. I recently dug out those plans, pieced to gether with graph paper and taped-up photo graphs. The street trees we wisely planted that first year, thanks to Friends of Trees (friend- softrees.org), are tiny, spindly things in those photos. We had planted them both in celebra tion of Portland’s legacy of wonderful street trees and to be a part of the urban canopy, and because the majority of our garden could use a buffer from the hot, relentless exposure on the west side of the house. The only things that were surviving out that way were heat lovers like lavender, and the vision of oasis would need some help. the sassy gardener BY LEANN LO C H ER 3 5 _ J 0 bination of echiums from Cistus Nursery (cis- tus.com) or a wine bottle art tree? W ho knows?* My vision may change, and that is quite all right— I’m letting it be. Get garden inspired: G a rd e n in g requires flexib ility b e c a u s e and never be completely successful in the end product. Gardening requires flexibility because This month brings a couple opportunities fa c e it: You c a n ’t co n trol nature. ... face it: You can’t control nature. You can’t con to get inspired in the garden. (You just missed T here are th in g s ab o u t g ard en in g that trol if the summer is going to top out at a few the Clackamas County Master Gardener^ 80 degree days (oh lord, let this summer not Spring Garden Fair; learn more year-round at sim p ly require p atien ce, and an ability be like the last) and you can’t control a bad clackamascountymastergardeners.org). outbreak of powdery mildew covering your Visit an open garden: LoneSomeVille Stu to “let it b e .” squash, cucumbers and roses. There are things dio Spring Open Gardens and Studio Sale. I look out the window today at those street about gardening that simply require patience, Portland’s most romantic and private garden trees, Pacific Sunset Maples. This time o f year and an ability to “let it be.” opens once a year. Stroll the acre garden and they are beginning to leaf out, and it looks like I’ve been stepping back from the garden and get first dibs on sales from their garden-inspired this is the year they’ll become as tall as our looking at it with a new eye lately. Through pottery. Sat., May 28,10 a.m.-4 p.m.; 5006 SE two-story house. The grass pathways I had en time our garden beds have become garden Long St., Portland; lonesomeville.com. visioned turned to mud as the shade began to rooms, built on year by year but disjointed from Visit one o f our amazing public gardens: creep in from our plantings, and this year they each other. This has come through a passion Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden. It’s will all be gone, replaced with a cedar chip and excitement of trying new things but, in the the time o f year when azaleas and rhododen pathway. This pathway now leads through what end, it’s not particularly pleasing. This year, the drons begin to scream with color, and there’s I call “the woodland garden,” and thinking unifying aspect will be the winding woodchip no better place to take it all in than this about how it was originally the hot dry magnet walk, and flower beds with enough stepping Southeast Portland public garden. April makes me laugh a little. stone pathways through them to allow me to 1-Sept. 30, 6 a.m.-lO p.m.; SE 28th and Not being afraid to change it up some— get to the plants and weeds for tending. The Woodstock Blvd.; $3 admission from 10 a.nfl whether if it’s because your tastes and visions lawn will finally be shaped into a beautiful oval, to 6 p.m. Thurs.-Mon., March through Labor change or because there are changes in your the front will finally have an entrance from the Day; 503-771-8386. J f l landscape such as new buildings or growing street to the front walk without having to tread trees—is something I’ve come to embrace across grass and errant dog poop, but every L f .A nn L ocher is an O SU Extension Master more and more the past several years. It’s so thing else may be up for fresh thinking. W hat Gardener who loves to dig in the dirt and talk all easy to hang on to a vision that’s unattainable to put in the front corner? Either a crazy com things gardening. E m ail sassygardenerdPgmail. com. ► 3 C IST U S N U R SER Y botanica: 22711 NW G HUMAN RD SAUVIE ISEAND, OR 97231 F L O R A L D ES IG N 503.621.2233 w w w .cistus.com open daily 10am to 5pm 5 0 3 .3 5 8 .4 6 8 7 www.F3otanicaFloralPDX.com feed tSEED HOME SUPPLIES ; . ! > 10920 NW Portland, O R 972 Phone: (503)286-1291 t Dog & Cat Shop Unique Accessories & I Fealthy Necessities for Dogs & Cats L ocatrd in thh H i - art o r H istoric M ississippi A v i from thk Q C i - n tfr 1/2 B i . ock 4039 N. # 104 P o r i i a n d , OR 97227 503-249-1432 M is s is s iim m : & • DAY O LD CHICKS • POULTRY SUPPLIES • • ORGANIC FEXD • GARDENING SUPPLILS • • ORGANIC FERTILIZERS • BIDDING PLANTS • • HARDWARE • FENCING • PLUMBING •
