Mary's Garden

This is written to honor my Mom’s creative genius.

Back in 1959 when Mom moved onto her one-and-a- half acres where she raised her five children there was not a single tree. Her entire property was a field. Over time Mom ventured into the nearby forests and gathered wild seedlings and cones, dug up wildflowers and shrubs and transplanted them onto her land. We kids brought Mom trees from Boy Scout and Girl Scout projects and acorns and pine cone treasures we found in the surrounding woodlands.

Mom kept track of development projects in her area and boldly approached the bulldozers, asking if she could dig up a rare batch of small-headed cattails or wildflowers that would be destroyed by the dozers. The workers always consented. Over time Mom turned her field into a wild woodlot, an obvious anomaly amongst her neighbors' over-fertilized and incessantly mowed lawns.

She laid PVC pipe down amongst her forsythia so her chipmunks could run to safety whenever she let her cat, Willy, out. The thickets that shaded Mom's yard became a haven for other wild animals as well - turkey, pheasants, deer, fox, raccoons, and all kinds of birds. Her favorite were the bright red cardinals who alighted on her crabapple and took turns flying to her window feeder.

Though Mom never considered herself an artist she has been creative in so many ways. She designed the interior of her split-level house with ingenious nooks and crannies for storage and efficient flow for five children and various pets, she sewed her own clothes, all sorts of costumes and dresses for me, quilts, tents, backpacks and sleeping bags, knitted endless sweaters of her own design, painted beautiful watercolors, and created dried flower arrangements for which she earned numerous blue ribbons in her garden club competitions. Everything Mom made was exceptional and of high quality but in my mind, Mom’s woodlot is her life journal and her ultimate creative expression. It reveals Mom's wild and beautiful spirit.