A recent cartoon in the New Yorker reminded me that the beach is usually not for gardening. You are surrounded by nature, but your reactions are muted by a type of voyeurism that says look but don’t touch. You are surprised by the lush inhabitants that flourish, grow and display themselves unambiguously for all to see. But if you are smart, you merely acknowledge the sublime beauty of what the beach has to offer. By the way, this includes plants and people.
Plants at the beach are amazing as you believe that they have no right to be alive. They are bombarded by salty water, hit by wind and grow in sand with few nutrients. Regardless there are endless varieties, some of which like beach plums, grow mainly on the beach.
Tomorrow I am headed off to Fire Island for a few days to stay with my sister-in-law and rejoin my wife, who has been there since Monday.
My sister-in-law shares a lovely cottage on the bay side of Fire Island. It is custom at the cottage to sit by the sea wall, drink in hand watching the sun set. Not a bad way to start an evening. Over the past few years she and her cottage mates have started to garden and I have become one of their advisors as well as contributors. Anyone can bring a six-pack for a weekend but you really can curry favor with the inhabitants if you deliver a hibiscus, variegated hosta or butterfly bush to the house. Given my current travails in the garden, I’m bringing seven small hostas to plant in the shady spaces around the cottage.
Although I’m hoping they will have a drink at the ready for me before I must pick up a shovel.
