Eminent Domain at Woodlawn Wilds

The garden space I tend across from my house catches most of the sun lost to tree cover in my backyard. The land was used for years as a waste place where kudzu and garden clippings held forth while it flipped for profit from hand to hand. Over the years, I've worked to make it home to a community of healing herbs. The folks who now hold title to the land are building a "Green" home up the bank, but tell me they will let the garden stay. So the Lemon balm and chocolate mint, calendula and valarian, St. John's Wort and celendine, sage and lavendar, feverfew and comfrey, pokeweed and red clover, taragon and parsley, and all the other common and not so common sunshine loving healing herbs I can find, will continue to have a place to be where their unique beauty and healing properties can be demonstrated to all passersby.

Julyan Davis, my neighbor, appreciates the garden also. Last month I looked out to find him there, easel set up and brush in hand, capturing the garden on canvas. The scene reminded me of one of my favorite paintings by Renoir.

Julyan has come by with his easel at all hours, and from time to time throughout the month, catching the sun and shadow play in the garden, and the plants in various stages of opening and growth.

Julayan honors the garden, a place I call my "eminent domain," and one that has offered hours of contemplative time as I learn the ways of my herbal companions.