A once beautiful garden now lives on in memories and photos in Daydreaming on the Porch

It’s been over a month now since we finalized the sale of Mom’s house, our “family homestead” for the past 25 years. I was there frequently, living there for 10 years while I was taking care of my mother who had dementia.

Mom loved that house so much, but we three siblings couldn’t afford to keep it, much as I would have liked. It was a custom built home, designed by my brother, quite unique architecturally to blend into the historic district, appearing as if it was a mid-19th century house, even though it was built in 1995. We had no choice but to comply with the city’s strict rules governing the construction of any new dwelling in the historic district. It had to look old and historic. My brother was up to the task and the completed house was honored with a coveted historic preservation award for a new construction that conformed to the historic character of Charleston, one of the oldest and most historic cities in the country.

The house is beautiful inside and out, but what I loved best were the big porch and the magnificent gardens in front and along the side of the house. We had it landscaped when the house was built. Over the years it became a lush and inviting oasis of green, with abundant areas of azaleas, hydrangeas, and camellias, and a beautiful dogwood tree near the entrance of the house. How I welcomed Spring each year as I sat and rocked on the porch on April evenings, soft breezes swaying the branches of budding crape myrtles.

I’ve unfortunately found it hard to finally accept the fact that new owners have taken over and the garden and house are in the past.

However, I could always just drive by to look at it one more time, and until yesterday, it looked mostly the same with the exception of the removal of a statue from the front garden, a major change, but I thought maybe that was it.

I parked the car near the house and walked over to have a closer look Sunday, but it had been changed dramatically. The entire garden, front and back, had been completely ripped out. Everything was bare and desolate looking. I was both shocked and surprised, but I shouldn’t have been. However, it was a very rude awakening, something I had not expected.

It was a sad sight for me. The house, in a very palpable sense, was no more. It was gone without that garden. There will be more major changes soon, and a new garden will likely thrive and be beautiful, but I don’t plan to go by again to look anytime soon. It’s gone! I have my memories and photos, and I’m thankful for that.

I recently found a poem I wrote about the garden more than 20 years ago. I think it captures the mood and atmosphere created by this treasured and much loved space. I’m so saddened that it only exists in pictures now.

My brother told me the other day, “Let it go.” He’s right, of course, but it’s very difficult to separate and depart for good when you’re leaving forever a place you once called home, in the best sense of he word.

Before and after
https://www.flickr.com/gp/camas/92y2v9926f

The Garden

I open the gate
 slowly
and with anticipation

(Ah, that portal through which we cross

And leave the old, dusty world

of traffic and noisy senselessness)

And enter a place serene

and bright with sunlight and flowers.

A gravel path weaves around

beds of vinca and tall blue hydrangea

Surrounded by Savannah holly

and crape myrtle trees and rose bushes

until I come to the purest,

sweetest-sounding little fountain

in a fish pond

with lily pads and goldfish;

and the fountain sounds like a little creek

one chances upon in the woods.

I sit awhile and listen
,
wind rustling pecan and hackberry trees,

the fountain murmuring into the tiny pond,
guarded by angels and lions.

And then I see the bright orange flash

and flowing fins of the fish

gracefully darting among water plants.

A garden is the kindest place of refuge

where patches of grass are gold-green

and zinnias flourish in a sea of colors.

In the garden, time stands still.

There is no sense of its passage at all, in fact.

I see only paths and statuary and overhanging trees
I see the magnolias blossom into pure white

with the freshest, purely clean and wondrous fragrance.

It rivals in memory the gardenia
s
which bloom in May.

And in this sub-tropical Eden,

Of memory and timelessness,

I can imagine a more perfect world

where the sun shines

and clouds sail overhead —
peaceful puffs of wandering gossamer,

vapors translucent

that chase their own shadows

over the ivy-covered walls that surround me

and keep the world at bay.

The garden, before and after:

https://www.flickr.com/gp/camas/vHp98Nu9m6