Tuesday, May 15, 2012

A Trip to Hulda's Garden

Ugh. Not so pretty "new" interface for the bloggists Blogger.What fresh hell? Must everything be "updated"? I am having a lot of trouble with change right now and this just looks like more bad news.

Guess I should just jump in dear reader and start where I am. On a blank page.

Beautiful time of year here in old PDX. Posie published a great list of things to do when you are in Stumptown. So go check that.

Photo by moi


Made a lovely visit to the Hulda Klager Lilac Garden with my own glorious mother and my beautiful baby boy. The gardens are open every year for a couple of weeks before Mother's Day to celebrate Hulda's legacy. When I discovered that Hulda lost everything in the floods of 1948 and had to start again at age 83, I was inspired to face my own neglected garden.

10 years ago, in a fit of rage, someone I loved took an axe to my own 100 year old lilacs in the backyard. They were at least 18 feet tall and 20 feet wide-a veritable lilac perfumed forest. I suspect they were just one more thing he could be jealous about.

My dear neighbor Hazel, who was born in the house next door, told me the lilacs had bloomed that prolifically all of her long life. My house is now at least 123 years old and the lilacs were here for most of that time. I have mourned them each spring and avoided my backyard (site of the massacre) for too long.

 My mother bought a beautiful Sarah Sands lilac, hybridized by Hulda, as a gift for me. So, I'm putting on my gauntlets and heading out to do battle with a forest of blackberry and residual heartache. Wish me luck.



For Mother's Day I painted my fingers. Early in the morning, before the temperatures climbed into the very un-Portland-like high 80's, we walked over to the Cartopia food carts on Hawthorne and ate crepes in the sunshine. It was a perfect day.



I think that you are aware my dear reader of how deeply grateful I am to have been gifted the mother I have. To share two beautiful, sun-filled days with both my mother and my son in a single week was so lovely. I do hope your Mother's Day was just as sublime.

Today's highlight, in addition to planting peppermint, pineapple mint, and CHOCOLATE mint (who knew?!) was a kind comment left by one of my longtime blog-crushes Janelle from Ngorobob House: Life From the Hill. You, my dear reader Red Tara, can imagine my fan-girl excitement! She had posted to her blog this morning after a bit of a break. Reading her post made my morning, so I stopped by hers to let her know.

Since the day I gave up monkey muffins, I have relied on writers who deliver the goods for my morning indulgence ( huge latte with honey and a google reader chaser). Janelle's blog is a favorite treat.

Another eagerly anticipated blog is Tania Kindersley's, Backward in High Heels. Like me, Tanya adores horses. She recently brought her red mare home to the far north  of Scotland. I have been planning to write about her experience with a commenter who suggested that readers were bored with her new found passion for the red mare. That she was too single-minded in her posts.

I tried to leave the following comment on her post:

Tania I wish I had commented on yesterday's post. All day my mind was humming with sympathetic joy for you and the red mare and the pony and the pigeon. I don't have an eloquent way to express it, but this coup de foudre has been what finally grabbed my attention and made me a daily reader after a long time of just occasionally visiting.

I am fascinated by people's passions. Especially those of women, as we have for so long been told to keep quiet about personal delight lest we call too much attention to ourselves.

I, too, have loved a horse and part of the joy of these posts has been the stirring of my own sweet memories. But greater than that has been the (admittedly voyeuristic) pleasure of following along as you throw caution to the wind and ecstatically follow your heart's desire. We should all be so brave and so lucky.

Thank you for such tremendous pleasure and for the honesty of your work on the blog which has come to feel like a delicious present I get to unwrap each day.I am so grateful.


For some reason I couldn't leave the post but I wanted to put it someplace to remind myself that what we love, what we are moved by, is the fuel of life. I feel so bogged down in the 'shoulds', the 'what-ifs', and sometimes even, oh the shame of it!, the 'what will they think of its?' that I need reminders and fuel.

To the women and men who write about their lives and passions and everydays I can only say thank you. And, I love you.

That's all for tonight. I'll figure out this new blogger trip another day.

I am working away on some new projects. If I can tear myself away from reclaiming my land, I'll be back to fill you in on the details.