Gardening

Toward the end of Death of a Salesman, the defeated Willy Loman plants carrot, beat and lettuce seeds in his small backyard in Brooklyn, at night, knowing that they will never grow. I've thought about doing this the last few nights. Some things don't break right at school and the lettuce seeds I got from Milo are ready to go into the ground.

Here's the thing. Gardening is not a literary device. It's not a symbolic gesture. Gardening is soil, seed and faith that things will grow. I wake up this morning to this scene:

It's worse. The backyard is part of a feral Brooklyn eco-system of worms, snails, rodents, cats and people. At night it hums with life. In the bleached-out day, I find this:

It's the link in the chain that's closest to me. I mean, it's ok. Creatures live and die, and this cat died long before I came along. Initially, I gather up its skeleton in a garbage bag that I plan to put out on the curb. But it doesn't seem right. For all I know, that cat died happily in the backyard and its soul would like to rest there. I'm becoming vaguely Christian through the sheer crushing force of life's demands and the Ann Lamott I read to cope, enough to wish to be of service to the cat's soul, whatever that means. So I dig a proper grave and bury it:

I stop short of eulogizing the cat. This makes me I'm glad not nuttier than I am.

Gardening. It's important to know that this is Gowanus soil. Gowanus is the worst name for any place, ever (Thanks, Dutch). It's also a superfund site. It's just not a good idea to eat vegetables grown in this soil. All I've ever grown before is vegetables.

So why not flowers?

They can't nourish you.

Maybe they can, in a different way?

Ok. Flowers.

I go to the hardware store to figure out how to grow flowers. I start with the idea of making a box, a raised bed. I have done this, so I know how to do this. I will buy the wood and attach the wood to other wood until there is a box. Then to choose some bulbs- what kind of flowers are the pretty flowers? I have no idea. My roommate told me she likes some kind of flower but I've forgotten which. Lauren likes tulips but there are no tulips here, and anyways, I'm planting this garden for myself. What's matters is to choose flowers that I'll like. That's it. That's all I have to do.

I choose lilly and gladiola because I like the names and pictures, but also because they're cheap and will grow early in the season. Checking out of the hardware store, the cashier tells me that they're beautiful, an unsolicited confirmation that what I'm doing is a good thing to be doing. Walking home with the flowers, I think about how I'd like to bring her a bouquet when they bloom, but I'm instantly aware of what an awkward gesture this would be. Moreover, her face is one of thousands I'll see in the course of my day and I've already forgotten it. It's ok. I'm growing these for me.

I build the box. I take move dirt from one part of the yard into the box.

I'm happy to have built this thing. I want to feel more of this happiness. I decide to build another box with the rotting boards in the yard. I turn one over and find this:

This scene is too beautiful to displace so I replace the board. The snails are a good sign. I remember how in Peru, we encouraged the farmers to find snails and add them to the compost. They enrich the soil with calcium. The word for snail is caracol. Later, when I'm washing up after the day's work, I find this surprise in the shower:

This makes me happy and I take many pictures from different angles and then return the snail to the yard. My roommate would not be thrilled with the surprise but I don't think she knows about this blog. Shhh. The impromptu bed comes together and looks like this, for perspective:

At the edge of the bed, I install a piece of wood to look like a headboard. Danny M, an old friend, has antlers at the edge of his raised bed, a sign of fertility. I want my headboard to be a sign of repose.

The flowers will grow or they will not grow. Either way I have built a garden: