Notes From The Field: Green Envy

By Cheryl Katz

My first – and last – foray into gardening was more than thirty years ago when, for one short year, I lived outside the city, in a small Victorian house with a back door that led to a bonafide backyard. I don’t know what possessed me to think I could coax anything to grow in that small green space. Save for youthful exuberance, I had no experience and even less knowledge about plantings. And patience, that all- important ingredient to successful gardening, was not one of my strong suits.

I’ll spare the details of that year’s costly green thumb disaster except to say it had a happy ending, bringing me careening back to a townhouse in the city where I didn’t have to worry about growing anything but a family. (There were window boxes to deal with and a roof deck, four flights up, begging for a container garden, but my husband Jeffrey had that under control.)

Every year since, when the garden bug hits, I remember my “year in the country” and choose to enjoy other, more talented, peoples’ gardens. I buy a ticket to the Beacon Hill Garden Clubs’ annual Hidden Garden Tour where I find myself with, just a little, green envy.

Photo courtesy of Peter Vanderwalker

Photo courtesy of Miroslav Bern

Photo courtesy of Thomas Lingner/The Able Lens

Photo courtesy of Peter Vanderwalker

This year’s self guided Hidden Garden Tour is on Thursday, May 16^th, rain or shine, from 9:00am-5:00pm. Tour tickets are $35.00 and VIP Tickets which include a President’s Luncheon and gift are $75.00 and are available at beaconhillgardenclub.org. Tour tickets can also be purchased on the day of the tour for $40 at the Hostess Booths on Charles Street.