Ugly in the Garden

A gardening friend and mentor who moved away a couple years ago recently emailed me to say she was in the area and would like to visit. Lovely! But also — a little like when your mother-in-law (substitute your feared relation here) calls to say she's coming to dinner. You immediately look around your home with her eyes, and bite your lip. (Not that I fear my mother-in-law. I love my mother-in-law. It's just a figure of comedic speech, to be sure.)

Here are just a few of the less than entrancing things I noticed in my garden.

It'll-come-in-handy-one-day-(but-where-to-store-it-meantime?) ugly. 

Actually more than three pieces of ugly in the photo above. The picnic table came with the house. It was ugly then and it's uglier now. Till recently, it was out of sight in the area that is now a shade house. I will paint it one day and put it on the deck upstairs.  

The flower windmill was stuck there by my granddaughter so that's sacrosanct! 

And the two garbage cans contain perlite and vermiculite — quite tidy but just not ornamental. I don't know where to store all my propagation stuff. Storage — it's a perpetual problem.

It's-for-the-birds ugly.

I've nearly pruned the above toyon's dead twigs more times than you can shake a stick at. But, the birds sit there at sunrise when they are warming their little birdy breasts. Hummingbirds especially love them.

It's-too-cussword-hard-to-remove ugly.

This red metal thing was a gigantic satellite dish holder. It's held in place by a massive concrete cube - too much work to move, so we'll just keep trying to come up with ideas on this one.  One day it could be turned into — um — the framework for — um — a sculpture, yeah, with perches for birds to sit on… But, as you can see from the white guano on top, they are using it as-is. So — no rush on that one, right?

Oh, and the telegraph pole on the left — that's one of those environmental uglies most gardens have. But it does host a regular gathering of  woodpeckers which is amusing. And it brings electricity which is definitely useful.

Work-in-progress ugly.

I got enthusiastic one day and started making a rock garden area to the right of the shot — so I needed stones right away and borrowed them from the closest source — the edging. I'll put it right really soon, really I will. Really. I mean it.

Edges make the lines of a garden clean — sort of like adding contrast to a photo to make it pop. This I know even if I don't practice it.

Pure-laziness ugly.

Hoses everywhere like scribbles on a nice painting. No excuses! Fix it NOW!

Also there's the nice silver ball that I haven't quite found the right spot for, and the broken blue goose that I'm going to do something creative with one of these days.

Weakness-for-ironical-kitsch ugly.

I love the serenity this Buddha figure brings to the garden. But accidentally pairing it with the frog my niece gave me one year for Christmas? — Adds a sidelong snigger of irony that may just undermine the effect a wee toty bit, d'ya think?

Weakness-for-Bambi-kitsch ugly. 

This little fawn came with the house and he's been living in my garden ever since, wandering around that garden bed from season to season and I love him. So there.

I did remove the pink flamingos so that's something, right?

Maybe your garden has none of these untidinesses and foibles, but I fear mine always will!