MidSummer's Day Dream

I walked my garden this morning, watering to offset the July heat. I have been ruminating on what changes I will make in the garden for fall. There is a long list.

It seems that any garden can look great in Spring. Spring is a time when everything in the garden is new and if it isn't new, it's just awakening so that things like slugs and bermuda grass and weeds haven't yet made their presence known.

July is a whole different matter. July shows you all the mis-steps, the shortcuts, the design goobers that you made but thought you outsmarted. July is when you see the real problems and when you have to make some big changes, at least in theory.

For the biggest challenge about July is that you really can't do much about the garden save plan for cooler weather, start hammering away at some hardscape (which is an effort in hard labor with the Oklahoma clay now in brick form).

In July, only really committed gardeners are showing up much at the garden center. Most annuals have already been planted for the year and the only thing left at my garden centers are some surly counter help and wilting trees that probably will find the trash heap come Labor Day.

I walked my garden this morning and noticed that I have planned better than before on the mulching. Although my roses aren't blooming anymore, at least their stalks and leaves seem nourished. And my shrubs are looking fuller, healthier and filling in more.

The biggeset thing my garden needs now is structure. I need to put in some heavy pathways and for this, I'm relenting and calling in the big guns. I'm either going to purchase my own tiller or hire the work done. My last pathway that I created looked great for about a year but I see now where having an expert do the work could save me a ton of time in maintainance and in planning. My battle with the bermuda continues to rage. When I asked a landscaper what he does about such issues he just looked at me and said, "What can you do about bermuda? You just have to stay on top of it everyday."

Which is what a garden is really. A constant maintaince, a constant source of meditation (for some) or a routine task that some find bothersome. I'd be lying if I said that weeding was a source of bliss and joy for me everyday but I do find that at times it can be rewarding, especially after a hard summer rain when the weeds peel off the earth in a satisfying way. Somedays it is rewarding to simply say, "look what I got done today" and show a clear path free of bermuda, dandelions and weeds.

Later today, I'm heading over to OKC Bricktown where I plan to see friends, sleep late, have a massage and tour some gardens. In short, time for rest.