One of the reasons we garden is for remembering.
When I moved to Sequim, Washington in 2019, I left behind my much loved garden. The little space was packed with fruit trees, veg’s, ferns, flowers and of course, wild life. I was eager to again create a lush and full garden in my new farm. The one acre Minipawss Farm consists of a small manufactured home, a workshop, a garden shed, a few fruit trees, and a grove of evergreen trees. Obviously, you can’t build a garden overnight. Nevertheless, I shopped feverishly and accepted all the garden “gifts” as they came my way. My cousin, Gail, gifted me two little seedlings. I was not particularly fond of Christmas cacti but I gladly accepted these little “kids” since I was in a hurry to build up my garden.
Fast forward 2 ½ years, these twins have become the beautiful companion of my daily farm life. Up to now, I thought that Christmas cacti only bloom around Christmas. However, these two beauties have been gracing my life with their dainty, almost translucent pink flowers every few weeks. As soon as they are done flowering, I pinch off the spent blooms. They then seem to take a rest as if fluttering off to a small vacation. In a few weeks, they come back, all refreshed and eager to bud and flower again.
When they bloom, they just make me smile.
In the new Minipawss Farm, I wanted to plant something to remember each of my elders. A row boat garden to honor my dad who took us kids boating every summer. We spent many hot days, climbing to the top of the cabin and jumping into the ocean non-stop. A vegetable garden to remember Roland, my father-in-law who fed us with incredible fruits, berries and produce from his little yard in the middle of Whittier, CA. You haven’t really had corn on the cob until you sit at his table. Dori, my mother-in-law, had a big pot of water boiling. Then Roland snapped off the ears of corn for the pot. The corns were as sweet as you can imagine. He also had a lot of boysenberries. Summers consisted of bowls of boysenberries with fresh ice cream. Camellias and hollyhocks to remember Dori by. Their vegetable garden bed was lined with huge pink hollyhocks. In the winter, she’d float large camellia flowers in bowls of water, set out fine china on a beautiful Battenberg lace tablecloth and served us the most delicious meals. And last but certainly not least, a flowering olive tree to remember mom by.
Mom planted a flowering olive tree in our little apartment courtyard on Earl Street, Hong Kong. Mom would mulch around the tree with peels from fresh ginger. That little tree by my bedroom window would bloom often. I loved the smell so much that I even tried to make perfume out of it. Many years later, we immigrated to America. Mom and dad settled down in a three bedroom house in Monterey Park, California. Immediately she planted flowering olive trees. They just smelled wonderful. When I moved to my house in Yorba Linda, I also planted a flowering olive. Over the years, the little tree had embraced me with many seasons of unassuming but fragrant flowers. Hummingbirds built nests in the small tree every year. And I put the fresh flowers in my tea. It was the most heavenly drink.
Mom and I didn’t get along at all. However, the flowering olive tree was what linked us together.
For two years I tried growing the flowering olive tree here in Sequim, WA. For two years I ended up killing the little saplings. However, these two little Christmas cacti have been thriving without much attention from me. They have been blooming their heads off since I got them. They are now what I remember mom by. Mom had some giant Christmas cacti hanging from baskets in her Monterey Park home. Now it seems those huge plants had sent their little cousins to come live with me.
The boat, the fruit trees and vegetables, the pink hollyhocks, red camellia, and the Christmas cacti. They are the beginning of my remembrance of the parents. This year, I am ordering thornless boysenberries and hollyhocks. And I haven’t given up on the flowering sweet olive tree yet.