Tinley Park, IL – Since the dawn of man, human beings have been enthralled by gardens. The colors, the fragrances, the textures and the tranquility seem to make us calmer, quieter and better people.
There are some who are merely voyeurs, content to sit on benches and observe the creativity of nature. There are others who putter a little with annuals and a tomato plant or two, never fully committing to sinking a trowel deep into the earth.
And then there are Gardeners. They are the ones who smell rain in the air, who monitor insect counts, who compost and collect rain water and who care about the quality of the soil that surrounds their homes. Gardeners are those who, to paraphrase Margaret Atwood, end each spring day smelling of dirt. Gardeners can’t walk through a landscape without pulling a weed or deadheading a flower. They gleefully spend entire weekends ripping out sod, spreading compost, transplanting, dividing and rearranging in a continuous effort to fulfill that elusive vision of the perfect garden.
True Gardeners love to share. They share seeds, cuttings and entire plants. They share insects and worms. They share zucchini with anyone who will take it. But mostly, Gardeners share information.
One such Gardener resides in the Southwest Suburbs of Chicago (that’s Zone 5, in case you’re interested) and shares information willingly and often. Rebecca Palumbo of Tinley Park writes and photoillustrates a blog, www.yearinthegarden.wordpress.com, about four times a week. Palumbo, who owns an advertising and design agency, began this adventure on the first day of spring of this year and will end it on the last day of winter in 2011. “My original goal was to make photographs every day so I could see what came up when and avoid digging up things like anemones, which disappear completely, when I plant in the fall. Then I thought I’d better take notes. Suddenly, it was a full-on project.”
Palumbo documents emerging plants, bloom cycles and die backs. She writes about successes in transplanting and unexplained failures and the best ways to fertilize. Many readers sympathize with her ongoing Battle of the Damn Rabbits. She was forced to fraternize with the enemy in late spring, as a cottontail doe chose her garden as a safe haven for six kits. “That was a real struggle,” laughs Palumbo. “Do I choose to protect my flora or do I call a temporary truce?” That truce was called and is thoughtfully and amusingly explored in the blog entries.
Technical notes abound, as she explains how to build chickenwire fence panels, how to deadhead coneflower and how to build a mulch pathway. There are notes on composting, explanations of a rain barrel system and ideas about improving vegetable garden layouts. There are reviews of northern Illinois nurseries and garden centers, recommendations about tools and facts about the birds and butterflies that call Midwest gardens home.
Palumbo has also explored many parallels she’s discovered between a garden and life. Her daughter will be finishing high school as the blog comes to a close and there are many mentions of the garden’s growth in relation to Eliza’s impending adulthood, along with Palumbo’s own parenting angst. Son Dominic experienced severe depression and his recovery is woven into the energy and work that makes a garden a success. “My mind is really being opened to all the ways that a normal life – with happiness and sorrow and mistakes and successes – is just like a garden. They are both fluid, never finished and there are unexpected things every day. There is always something you want to tweak and there is always something to just sit back and enjoy. And sometimes, the garden makes its own decisions, just like life.”
Her photographs illustrate buds, blooms, seed pods, spiderwebs, leaves, watermelons, purple runner beans and even weeds. “I try to make an image of everything,” Palumbo says. “Even the unattractive stuff.” There are images that follow the progression of plants like allium from sprouts to buds to blooms and then to seed heads. There is even a series of milkweed bugs engaged in acrobatic copulation. “Nothing is private in the garden,” notes Palumbo.
The blog is enjoyed by many, from those who just think about having a garden and enjoy the photographs to the real Gardeners who want solid information about pampas grass, milorganite and a really good quality trowel. Palumbo is regularly contacted by those asking for advice and by those giving it. “The rain barrel system was inspired by a regular reader and the photograph she emailed to me. One woman in particular feels the same pain I do about the Damn Rabbits and we commiserate via email and Facebook. The topic of herb storage created a lively conversation between a number of readers and myself.”
The garden project has been personally fulfilling to Palumbo. While her artistic bent has always enabled her to appreciate things many fail to notice, she is noticing even more – and delights in sharing it. Thoughtfully, she says, “Ultimately, what I’m learning is that a garden – and life – changes every single day, that beauty and grace can be found outside your front door, that nothing lasts forever and there is almost always another chance. I’m understanding that every little thing has a role and a place and a function.” She chuckles. “I’m also learning that I’m not the only one who’s a little nuts about gardening.
