III. Writings from the Edge of the Apocalypse: Subconscious FM Radio Weighs In.
The rare and beautiful variegated Madrona in my yard.
March 27, 2020, one week into it.
I’m driving to The Garden Center in my mobile office, which is what I call the car. I often return calls to family and friends while puttering along. But now that I think about it, rarely business ones even though I call it my office. I have no idea what state I will find the greenhouse when I arrive, and Monday night Governor Inslee declared a version of Shelter in Place.
I went to Costco earlier in the day. 75 people were let in at a time. Despite the large warehouse, employees monitoring lines and notices posted everywhere regarding COVID-19, shoppers seemed unaware of each other. This was either the worst example I’ve seen of social distancing or the best example of how it fails.
Subconscious FM radio awakens in my head as I shopped. I never know what it might choose and very often I’ll start humming a song without having put a dime in the juke box. It selects Talking Heads, “Life During Wartime.”
“This ain't no party, this ain't no disco,
This ain't no fooling around
No time for dancing, or lovey dovey,
I ain't got time for that now.”
In my haste to get out of Costco I inadvertently purchased two very expensive bottles of wine.
I parked the mobile office, walked into the nursery and grabbed my walkie-talkie, which I’m told is actually called a radio these days. I overheard the managers debating what to do as I clocked in. Stay open? Close? What about the employees? As I made my way to the greenhouse and the uncertainty of my job weighing heavily, Subconscious FM Radio starts having a drama moment and selects the Eagles, “I Cheat the Hangman,” a nod to the opportunities in the past I thought I had surely lost, and repeats only a single line over and over:
“But I cheat the hangman, cheated him many times before. . . “
And then alternates it with a line from a famous Doobie Brothers tune:
“Minute by minute, by minute by minute, I keep holding on.”
Never mind this is a love song and I’m not dating the nursery, but it is a useful line that can apply to many situations so I understand my mind’s preoccupation.
The word comes down about 1:00pm. Although considered an essential business and with it the right to keep our doors open, managers decided to reduce exposure to its customers and employees and go to curbside service only. I’m surprised nurseries are given this designation in general, although as a gardener I couldn’t agree more: the joy gardening brings coupled with the outdoor serenity of a nursery are necessary ingredients to reducing stress and bolstering our immune systems. Gardening also reduces exposure to 24-hour news channels and their incessant speculation, further reducing stress and further bolstering our immune systems.
This means I still have a job. With a little bit of extra work for the customer, and a whole lotta extra work for management and employees, people can still plant their Victory Gardens.
Shifting overnight from a walk-in, sensory based shopping experience, to phone and email orders of highly subjective, sight unseen product is no small task. Stay tuned dear reader, as the transition unfolds, and see below for photos that are not of the nursery (seems too soon for selfie pics there) but of the kindred spirits in my back yard as spring “sproings” despite the burgeoning COVID-19 apocalypse.
©Theresa Elliott, All Rights Reserved
The meter, March 28, 2020
Beyoncé and the Giants.
Mal demonstrates her Yard Waste Foot Bin Pose, without the bin. A chip off the old block.
Moving a very large carex.
Contorted Filbert, giving Beyoncé a run for the money.
Winter iris still irising.