I WOKE UP this morning and found myself standing at the front window, coffee in hand. The view falls on my tiny front porch which was, on this particular morning, covered with snow.
It's been a long time since I grubbed around in the dirt. Though I love this new apartment, it comes with one major drawback: no garden. To make matters worse, it's on the second floor of a restored 1920's apartment building. For even more of a challenge, the house boasts only one tiny, mostly shaded east-facing balcony that looks down onto a smoggy, busy street. I don't mind saying I despaired.
But no more! In every free moment I've been thinking of ways to turn these negatives into assets: to get a garden started. A garden would act as a screen from the hustle and bustle of the street below; it would make the porch look like a million bucks; and best of all, a garden would provide organic veg, herbs- and maybe even a few fruits- free for the picking. I've watched the porch at all hours and have decided that it gets at best five hours of direct sunlight on one puny railing- not exactly encouraging!
But we live in Memphis. We're located in Zone 8, the Mississippi Delta region of Tennessee, and I'm hoping that maybe the shade will be an asset in our hot, dry summers, preventing the scorching that's killed so many of my plant experiments in the past. At any rate, after being bucked-up tremendously be reading The River Cottage Cookbook by Englishman, downsizer, and all-around good guy Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall, I'm going to (as he would say) give it a go.
I'm hoping to turn this patch of urban concrete into something that will provide olfactory and culinary joy all year 'round... provided that everything goes according to plan.
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