malva

To visit a garden properly is a demanding business; most visitors simply don't have the time.

One of the things childhood is is a process of learning about the various paths that lead out of nature and into culture, and the garden contains many of these.

Roses are at their best trailing down in graceful trusses. In fact, they are like supermodels--the goods just look better displayed on tall, thin, limbs.

In the end, this may be the most important thing about frost: Frost slows us down. In spring, it tempers our eagerness. In fall, it brings closure and rest. In our gotta-go world--where every nanosecond seems to count--slowness can be a great gift. So rather than see Jack Frost as an adversary, you could choose to greet him as a friend.

Gardening may well be one of the world's most important fantasies.

Gardening is never risk free. It's not risk free in your first year and it's not risk free in your 40th. . . .There's always another strange spin on the ball. There's always more to learn.

In my part of the country, there comes each year one long and occasionally fruitful season when gardening takes places strictly on paper and in the imagination.

…the shivery perfection that winter can bring to our gardens.