Daring Garden Run!

I suspect that LA is going to be locked down even more strictly than now at any moment, and also due to the virus's doubling rate, anything people=adjacent that can be done today will be safer than doing it tomorrow.

So today I got up early - pre-coffee, even! - and ventured to The Marina del Rey Garden Center, where I made the acquaintance of Patches the friendly garden cat. The cart has my purchases - I even found California poppies in pots!

If you watch the video at the website, you'll see that it was the safest possible place - almost completely open-air and, when I went there, almost completely deserted. The parking lot is the size of a postage stamp, so a pandemic was the perfect time to go.

I figured this was going to be my last chance to get seedlings for spring and very possibly summer, so I stocked up. My strawberries have been doing very well, so I got more. Also dill, lemon balm, a cucumber, what I hope is a mini-cucumber-melon, variegated thyme, curly parsley, poppies, and probably a few other things I forget. Also ladybugs and a praying mantis case.

I've never seen the air so clear or the streets so deserted. It's beautiful and eerie. I love the natural environment of LA, and that's never been better. But I also love the people, who are the life of the city, and they're all gone, locked away like me.

I'm tending my garden for spring, and hoping the coming harvest will be both real and metaphoric.