Maria and I are having a kind of summer blast with gardening. I have to confess, I am not a natural gardener, I am a natural digger and waterer. For Maria, gardening is a way of connecting to the earth, as all pagan witches seek to do. For me, it is something else really, I deeply love to see our old farmhouse ringed with green things and flowers, it brings all of us – house and people – to life. And I do love caring for the plants and flowers, even if I never know their names.

Last week, we were at a nursery and Maria yelled with delight, she saw a fig bush. She loves figs, and so we bought it. We were told not to plan the fig plant, the winters here can be too cold for it. We leave it outside for the Summer and Fall – I think it likes sun and and shade – and bring it into the basement for the winter (with the Dahlia bulbs).

In a month or so, we should have our own figs. I moved it off of the back porch – too much sun – and out under a lilac bush. Sun in the morning, shade in the afternoon. It seems happy there. I’m even starting to talk like a gardener.

I love keeping things healthy and caring for them, it touches and helps heal some broken part of me. In my other life, gardeners and landscape people were people I always hired. I wouldn’t do that now. I’m excited to have a fig bush. Or plant.