Occasional conversations about the garden with my grandfather, whose passion for the garden I didn’t discover until I started reading through old family letters. My grandfather Jim wrote these letters to my mother and aunt, spanning from the 1940’s until right before his death in 1978.

June 2, 1977

From a letter to my aunt…

“The absence of rain has done ruinous things to the lawn and flower beds.  We have continued watering the vegetables and they are now responding to our attention – beans, tomatoes, cucumber, squash, beets, lettuces, green peppers are now producing; we await cabbages, broccoli, eggplant.  Glads (gladiolas) have startled us with their beauty as have the roses and hydrangea.

I enquired in the Barber Shop this morning regarding local help for yard work & expect to be hearing soon from candidates for the job…”

I love you, I love you.  Dad

June 2, 2021

Dear Jim,

I am envious of everything that is blooming in your Florida garden.  We are coming off a cold, rainy time of it.  The BroodX cicadas have descended upon the Shenandoah Valley, filling the air with their incessant trills and buzz.  It’s quiet in the morning and then once the temperature reaches 70 degrees, the songs start.  They are poor fliers, lurching around, landing on you with a thud and looking at you with their astonishing red eyes.  Yesterday I spent the day planting out the dahlias and they kept me company in the hundreds, covering the winter Hawthorne tree in the front garden. 

The cutting garden is looking terrific after the rain, filled with corn cockle, orlaya, spikey stalks of purple larkspur, blupeurum and bachelor buttons.  These are all flowers I grew from seed, planted during the last few warm weeks of summer.  They quickly germinated and then spent the winter under wraps, emerging this spring.  The dogs love walking down the rows and the neighbors have been interested to watch the bed transform from rows of bare earth to delightful flowers.

It’s funny that finding help in the neighborhood hasn’t changed much.  Any help I’ve found for the garden has been via word of mouth or a card posted on the cork board at the local pizza place.

If you were visiting tonight, we would walk through the garden where I would proudly point out my English garden roses in bloom and cut a small bouquet for us to enjoy at dinner.

I love you. I love you.  Julie