When I first bought the house, I seized every opportunity to introduce myself to any and all neighbors that would stop and listen. One special woman, whose eyes told a story of age and experience, waved an intrigued greeting from her alley side parking spot. We spoke brief pleasantries and then she was gone. Feeling a sense of incompleteness in our encounter, I found myself walking up the hill and around to her front door about 40 minutes later. She was welcoming and genuine. She invited me in, introduced me to her calmingly stoic dialysis bound husband... and we sat and talked in her parlor...
Fyi...old people have parlors.
We talked for just shy of an hour and she told me about her and her husband...the history of my house... the neighborhood... the city.
Flash forward nine months... and a three floors of new neighbor.
We spoke on Friday and she told me that once upon a time, she thought about planting a garden in the space between our homes. She assumed now that like my other street mates, I would exercise eminent domain over the incomplete alley that separates our houses, stretching my lot back an extra ten feet or so…and thus... she dismissed the garden idea.
Having on-site vegetables production has always been a part of the sustainable site vision of growahouse. I never thought about it being a community garden. Even if the community is just my rear neighbor and I.
I think she should have a place to grow her peas
... and so the vision for my garden, not unlike my renewed vision for my life, will have to grow to allow to for other seed planters.