What’s the memory garden? This is a long-term project I’ve had in my head for many years, and will take years to realize. I thought it would be nice to include in my larger garden a collection of plants that were from places I’ve lived over the years, and I’ve lived in a lot. Collect a seed from, or take a cutting of, a noteworthy plant, perhaps a run-of-the-mill maple or an extraordinary palm, from an address where I’ve lived, and try to grow it.
As I’m back in NYC after years away, I turned to my old stomping grounds in the East Village first, since they were easy to get to. My favorite individual plant in New York is the five-story Wisteria growing on a tiny one-block diagonal street called Stuyvesant Street. Here it is in full bloom, in early May 2014.
Here, later in September, we see its beautifully funny, fuzzy seed pods, looking like fat beans hanging down, too high up to grab. A few weeks later I found a couple that had fallen and collected them. When dried, the pods will suddenly twist open one day, explosively firing their seeds over a distance of some feet.
I planted a few in early 2014 along with my garden veggies. It took weeks, I think, maybe months… but eventually they sprouted. Here’s the one that survived all season. I eventually took it indoors to protect it from winter, but it came within a hair’s breath of dying. Come midsummer, it picked itself up and kept shooting out new leaves. I’ll have to find a way to protect it this year. They say it may take ten or twenty years before it flowers. My goal: two years. OK, that’s not realistic, but a man can dream.
A few blocks away on East 10th Street, there’s a humble Locust tree that goes unnoticed by passersby in its midblock tree bed. I took some seeds from it as well, as it’s perched in front of the apartment I used to live in.
Months later, and I mean about five months later, one of its seeds finally sprouted, long after I’d given up hope and wondered why I was still watering its pot. Welcome to the family!