The best-laid plans

 

Unplanted recent acquisitions

When will I learn? 

I held firm every time I went to my favorite garden stores, buying only and exactly what I needed, as much as I longed for some of the plants presenting their glorious flowers to me. Things I had always wanted to plant and told myself to wait until I was ready. Until the time was right. Until I had a fairly unshakable sense that I knew enough about what I was doing planning a "mixed rose border" to do such a thing. Make no obvious and glaring errors, and people can still believe you do know what you are doing. Make them, and it's Game Over. You are unmasked for the amateur with the sadly limited natural talent that you are. 

And then I cracked, and I bought everything. Everything I could fit onto a single cart, crowding them all together and using every possible bit of it. I did this despite a observing a man, who was wandering about, gazing sadly at the plants, and just barely repressing long sighs, and who finally looked up at me and said, "They are all in such sad condition. It's late in the season, I guess." 

And there I was, thinking they looked glorious. This should have been my signal to stop and put everything back and go home with the cat food. But noooooo. Ever Miss Mary Sunshine, always at the ready to bolster the flagging moral and hopes of any person, friend or stranger, mostly myself, I said, "Oh! They aren't that bad! All they need is proper planting and care, and they'll jump right back!"

Every sentence I speak, having anything to do with plants and gardens, finishes in a "!"! Plants! Flowers! Gardens! Every gardening tool known to gardeners! Compost! Nematodes! Lady Bugs! Mulch!

I wasn't wrong (or so I tell myself), however unconvinced he was, and then I made the mistake of stopping on the way home at my other favorite garden store to see if they had the Cransebill geraniums I wanted, and guess what? The worst. They had just had a shipment of fresh plants. Exactly what I had just bought, and in vastly better condition. It was gorgeous. I longed for it all. I kept the smile pasted firmly on my face, and bought  -- some more. Oh God. 

I bought all this without calculation. Without making a plan. I bought all of this by some sort of instinct that I hoped would serve me not too badly. It looked soooooo beautiful in the car! How could I be wrong! It would surely work out! I have an eye for color! I'd go home and paint with plants! It would be sensational! Ha! 

And yet, the plants are still sitting there, waiting for me to decide exactly where they belong. 

"This time, you'll plant them, and not leave them to die, right?" asked my husband. Of course! 

"I'm just giving myself the time to move them around until I have it just exactly right!" I said, and he believed me. 

Feeling insecure about the quality of my instincts, I set out to come up with a way to do it on paper. That would do it! I'd be certain of my decisions! 

It wasn't a bad idea, my system. With great concentration and industriousness, I cut out and colored the rose bushes and glued them where they were in the beds. Then, I sketched out the increasing heights of the roses and the plants I had bought. Now, all I had to do was make corresponding colored cutouts for each of them and move those around until I had used them all up and they seemed to be in the right place by color, height and size. Simple, right? 

That effort fizzled in a puddle of insecurity and laziness, too. 

My plans

The unending rain has allowed me to save face (for awhile) under cover of bad weather, while I wait for inspiration to speak to me, but this isn't going to last forever. 

....