All Its Jostling Population

 

My wife and I paid a visit to New Paltz public garden last night.  My wife was intrigued.  I was happy to go along for the ride.  Indeed, I was essential, as she’d tried a few times recently and couldn’t find the place to park.  I showed her how Huguenot Street continues along out eventually towards 32.  And then, heading back through town I took the right on Main St. and right before the bridge right way meandered once again, along the river at the head of Huguenot Street until we came to the Municipal Parking Lot where we could walk down beside the river to the public farm plots. 

We both admired the tall fence that surrounded the space and called out loudly: deer-proof.  We traipsed around the perimeter, considering the tall grass, and spied a what might have been an egress.  I came upon a handsome oak which, if I’m to believe my Seek app, is onee I’ve never seen before.  It is known as a burr oak with tight, rounded leaves and a maple I’d never seen before either dubbed a Freeman’s Maple. By this time my gal was already inside, and I followed her in the front door, to see what people were growing. 

 

Lots of strawberries in one patch.  Another person had a ton of tomatoes.  And one patch toward the front was mesmerizing with all its jostling population of cinnabar flowers.  “They’re poppies” a woman mentioned to us as we stood staring and photographing.  There must have been a few hundred red flowers in the tight patch and when we asked her, she confirmed that she was indeed the cultivator behind the patch.  “Look here” she beckoned and showed us a remarkable white flower amid the crimson plot, which she suggested was a Himalayan Poppy.  “Planted it last year and it didn’t show.  It only arrived this year.  Isn’t it gorgeous?”  And indeed, it was. 

 

Her name was Myra.  We chatted for a while, about New Paltz and her garden and her kids and of precisely how it was one could open a plot and set something up here that would allow one to participate.  I suggested to my wife, as we walked back to our car, with Myra beside us that this might be a great place for her to start a patch.  She was polite, but when we entered our car and bid Myra adieu she clarified that no, she was not starved for sociability and hand plenty of soil to grow her own plants on. 

 

 

 

Saturday, 06/05/21