whitestone marigolds
September 10th, 2021 @ 12:14 am
when we all started working from home last year, i started saving over $300 per month towards my commute into midtown. i paid off my credit card and starting saving money, so i figured i’d splurge a little here and there. so i finally caved and bought myself a dumb little ice cream cone vase from jonathan adler, last september. i had my eyes on it for years, and i just never had the funds to justify spending almost $100 on a vase not even 8″ tall. so finally i did, and then knew exactly what i wanted inside of it… marigolds.
unfortunately for me, by the time i figured out that i wanted marigolds, they were out of season for purchase and it was wayyyyy too late to plant them. it was around september/october and i was like “well duh, of course my autumn obsessed ass wants orange flowers NOW…“. then i realized why i like them around that time of year.
when i was in kindergarten, they took my class for a walk in the fall one afternoon. i remember it was cold out, and i remember we only went across the street, along 147th st. i remember our teacher was telling us to look at things, smell things, touch things, etc., and i remember seeing marigolds on a house between 15th and 16th aves. i loved how it looked different from other flowers. i didn’t pick it, but i do remember smelling it and i guess being the first flower i remember smelling, it just always stuck with me. whenever i smell them, it takes me right back to that moment in 1985.
i loved 1985/86 so much. maybe that’s why i hold that smell so close to my heart/memories. i was only 4, so i was ignorant to the bullshit going on with my mom and my sister’s (rich/drunk) father… but at that time, we lived in a huge house, at some point my aunt carol moved into the basement apartment, so i got to hang out with her all the time, my huge family all still got along, i had every 80s toy you could think of, my life consisted of taking long car rides with mom and listen to 80s music all day, we had a summer house in the hamptons… life was good, before life was no longer good.
ffwd to june 2021: i remembered to plant marigolds this year! i asked my landlady if i could plant some in the backyard this year, and she said “of course!”. i went out and bought like 3 or 4 packs and planted them baddies. i wasn’t taking progress pictures, but the pic on the right is when they were starting to come in. MY LITTLE BBYS!
i’ve filled my little vase three times this year, but left them alone and thriving in the garden for the most part. the span i planted all of the seedlings was like 5/6 feet wide, so there were so many at peak bloom.
it was a joy to have them all summer during this shite/never ending pandemic.