angels

“Magic is always pushing and drawing and making things out of nothing. Everything is made out of Magic, leaves and trees, flowers and birds, badgers and foxes and squirrels and people. So it must be all around us. In this garden—in all the places.”
Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Secret Garden

Several weeks ago I made a Vision Board. I printed it out and I go over it every morning when I sit down here first thing. There are lots of things on it, one of which is “My beloved Dragonfly Cottage is my safe haven with beautiful gardens everywhere.” I so longed to create a magical garden here again but I didn’t begin to know how that would happen. I whispered it with hope in my heart each morning and then, as you do with Vision Boards, I let go and went on about my day. From time to time I would walk outside and see the tangle of weeds and overgrown areas and sink into despair deciding that it would never happen. I couldn’t begin to imagine how to even begin.

Early this week a dear woman, whom I now consider one of my garden angels, sent me a donation and said it was specifically to start a pot garden on my deck. I worked all week on carefully portioning the funds and making plans to start. When the seeds I’ve ordered arrive by the end of this next week I will begin planting and setting the pots out on the deck. I was absolutely delighted, and it opened the door to the garden in my heart. I cleaned out the raised beds and ordered seeds to plant there, and as I was working outside I looked around at the large garden areas that had once been a thing of beauty but were nothing more than a barren landscape save the roses growing along the fence. I shook my head and went inside. I couldn’t imagine ever being able to reclaim all of that.

Then Maurice came. My friend Jeff sent Maurice to clean up my yard over the last month. It actually took 3 trips here to clean up the pine straw in the front yard there was such a heavy covering of it everywhere with the huge loblolly pinecones that fall from the giant old pines. And then the back yard is so big and the leaves so deep from my heavily wooded property it took two days for Maurice and a friend to get it all cleaned up. It was definitely an improvement but it made the barrenness of the old garden areas tangled with weeds all the more apparent. I just felt sad looking at it. I had no idea that God had sent me an angel in Maurice, and when he came today — we had agreed on a price for him to do the grass cutting and basic maintenance twice a month — I had no clue what would really happen. I have had different people cut the grass here since I moved in 8 years ago and they haven’t been very reliable, and were in and out as quickly as they could cut the grass on their riding mowers, do some edging, and blow things off. In not much more than half an hour they were gone.

Maurice is an older gentleman, southern to the core, gentle, and kind, and soft-spoken. When we agreed on a price it was a little more than I had paid the last man but he promised that he would “take care of me” and do more than just cut the grass. I had no idea what he meant. He was here for more than 4 hours today. He brought a push-mower, the first person to ever cut what is a pretty good size piece of property without a riding mower or tractor — and a few tools. He went over everything with a fine tooth comb. Cleaned up a ton of pinecones that had fallen since his last visit, cut the grass, took down the weeds in a once beautiful area near the street that has been a tangle, and tidied up in general. The front yard looked lovely when he finished, but what he did in the large back yard was nothing short of a miracle.

After cutting, well, I was going to say the grass but it has really become more weeds than grass, he went around the whole perimeter of the property and took the weeds down everywhere. All along the long fenceline you can see the roses again. All along the back of the property where wild saplings were coming up everywhere he cut everything down until it was clear. He pruned 4 big loropetalum bushes, cut down the weeds in the green gated garden which had begun to look like the impenetrable entrance to Sleeping Beauty’s Castle. Finally, he knocked on the front door and said he was done and he wanted to see what I thought. As we walked through the gate to the back yard I was absolutely in shock. Everything was neat and tidy and clean and clear. I just stood staring, unable to believe what I saw. He said, “I told you I would take care of you, and this is the beginning, we’ve got a lot of work to do.” In that moment I realized that I could not only reclaim my garden — not that it will ever be what it was, it couldn’t be, it was like Disneyland back there! — but a quieter, old-fashioned cottage garden was possible. It will take time of course, years, but I hadn’t been able to imagine how such a thing could even be possible at all.

Maurice and I walked around the garden. He told me that he could clear out the beds all the way down the fence and in the green gated garden and get the soil ready for planting. This would be a huge job and he would only charge me a very modest fee. I just couldn’t believe it. I looked around with tears in my eyes. Imagine, I thought, I could plant hollyhocks and sunflowers all along the fence. The green gated garden could be planted in zinnias and cosmos and more. I can’t afford to buy plants for these areas but I can plant seeds, it will be a start. And with my raised beds and pot garden on the deck I will have more of a garden this year than I had dreamed of having in many years to come. I hugged Maurice hard and thanked him profusely.

As we walked back around the front of the house he looked up at the roof, a couple of good sized branches are up there. I have seen them but not known what to do about them. He said, “I’ve got to get those down. Next time I come I’ll bring a ladder.” And as we walked around the other side of the house I asked him what in the world to do with, well, it looks like a cross between a tree and a gigantic weed! It is covering the gate on that side so you can’t even go through it and it is overhanging the house. He said, “That’s got to come down. I’ll do that for free.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. As he pulled out of my driveway I stood looking after him for some time, and for the first time I thought, “I’m not alone in this anymore, oh my God, everything really will be okay…” I have been so afraid and overwhelmed. This is just all too much for me to do by myself but I’ve never had anyone to help me. Now I have Maurice, and there is no doubt in my mind that he is an angel sent from heaven.

I had forgotten all about my Vision Board. I sat back down here at my desk and there it was, “My beloved Dragonfly Cottage is my safe haven with beautiful gardens everywhere.” I sat here stunned. It’s true, it’s all coming true. In the space of one week I have begun to garden again, everywhere, thanks to my two angels. There is magic all around indeed. And now I return to my garden to work and dream and see what kind of garden it will become. A new kind of garden, the perfect garden for me right now. Dragonfly Cottage is alive once more.