Day 67 Coffee on the steps, and what's in a definition?

Harley as I am blogging...

This morning, before I got to writing I was having my morning coffee on my sidewalk steps with my two cats. I was lucky enough to meet and chat with three wonderful women who stopped to visit as they passed by.

Brenda was walking downtown to work and stopped by to comment on the garden. She commented that she was amazed how much it has grown...I said it amazed me too...and that I am not sure what exactly it's growth is due to as we don't fertilize...maybe it's all the love (okay, I know that was corny...but I couldn't resist, and...it is true).

Then I met Cindy, she had just dropped her kids off at a art session at the Bowman so was going for a walk around the neighbourhood. She lives on an acreage east of Coaldale at Stafford Lake...she said that unfortunately to the North of there house is the McCains plant...which she said would not be sooo bad it they would at least turn their lights off at night. We discussed our yards, and some of the different plants in the garden (she may come back in the fall when we divide plants to get some drought tolerant plants for her garden).

As Cindy and I were talking Stella walked up with a cute black dog. She said it was her daughter's dog who she was babysitting. Stella lives around the corner on 13th street. She had read about the garden in the newspaper so came by to have a look, 'I think it is just wonderful what you are doing' she remarked. She then shared some of her own garden's successes and failures this year...unfortunately she lost her tomatoes and cucumbers : ( but she froze lots of peas and beans. I had some tomatoes, a cucumber and young zucchinis in the basket, I told her to help herself to any tomatoes. She looked into the basket and then shared 'the perfect recipe for young tender zucchini': thinly sliced zucchini, onion and tomato that you either bake or fry until the vegetables are tender, add mozzarella cheese and leave until it melts, 'mmmm' she said, 'it is wonderful!' I agreed, and said that is the same recipe my mom used to make for us...and it is still one of my favorites. This is also good with green tomatoes.

Stella mentioned that she would not mind having a large zucchini as she would then make some zucchini loaf. I told her I would let one grow and bring it over to her...'only ONE!' she said with a smile.

Some have asked about the definition of 'guerrilla' in guerrilla gardening...The following definition was posted to the Heavy Petal website, http://www.heavypetal.ca/index.html The guerrilla.gardening.org site she mentions is a great site, and I recommend visiting it - this Boulevarden is listed...as well as hundreds more around the world.

What is guerilla gardening?

I often find myself explaining guerilla gardening, and often I question whether I'm getting my description just right. This e-mail from Richard of guerillagardening.org is just the thing to clear the confusion, and I thought it was well worth reposting here.

Dear Troops,

On 18 May Anna from Vancouver enlisted at GuerrillaGardening.org. She is Anna 3000, our three thousandth guerrilla gardener. With this milestone, with the Northern Hemisphere summer approaching us and with a flurry of guerrilla gardening in the news again, it is time we looked at ourselves and asked WHAT IS GUERRILLA GARDENING? Should some one ask you I suggest you put in three minutes of study now by reading on, so you can reply to them with one sentence.

I shall assume we all know what gardening is. The question is what makes it guerrilla gardening rather than just gardening? Last week the New York Times and The Times in Britain reported the incredible two-day turfing of London's Trafalgar Square with 2000 metres of grass as "Guerrilla Gardening."

It looked amazing (we can debate this ecologically questionable short-term gesture another time), but was it really guerrilla gardening? It was done at night, it was incongruous, it turned a stone square into something green... but does this make it guerrilla gardening? Not to me. It was a legitimate marketing stunt, funded by the London tourist board and installed by professional gardeners - it was what is commonly called guerrilla marketing.

Another new definition of guerrilla gardening popped up in a San Francisco newspaper last week. There they said it was "gardening public space with or without permission."

That definition makes a lot of people guerrilla gardeners who are not and misses out all those guerrillas who garden private space without permission! Community gardeners, volunteer groups, even those municipal workers who occasionally ravage grass verges with their giant strimmers and ride-on-mowers (yes this last lot look like a highly mechanised force, but they are not guerrillas, they are just the regular army).

What is there guerrilla about gardening in public space with permission? The word guerrilla was coined in the early 19th century to describe the Spanish response to Napoleon's invasion of their country. It means "little war." If you have permission you have won the war. In fact you may not have even fought one. You are the lucky ones and should celebrate that victory and legality rather than pretending the fight continues. The guerrilla gardeners, who coined the phrase, in 1970s New York went legal as soon as they could and became community gardeners. This legitimization enabled them to achieve far more but would not have been reached without the initial guerrilla action.

Masquerading as a guerrilla belittles the endeavours of those who really are taking risks challenging access to and the condition of land, and it confuses those who might want to start doing it. "Guerrrilla" has become a groovy word, and some gardeners mischievously "sex up" their activity by slapping the G-word on it. This is guerrilla marketing not guerrilla gardening...

Guerrilla gardening is the "illicit cultivation of someone else's land." That is your sentence should anyone ask.

It is a simple strategy for winning access to space and a way of improving it sooner than bureaucracy will allow. It can be very politicised and it can be very low key. Sometimes it is a short-term gesture, but always it is done without permission. Those who have progressed to gardening in peace can celebrate, but do not forget your guerrilla roots. War can return, the land you have permission to garden may be taken away, and a fight will be needed.

I am approaching peace on some of fronts; tentative negotiations have begun about two locations in London. In those territories I will have become a Community Gardener and Volunteer Gardener. I shall not pretend this is still guerrilla gardening. On other fronts the guerrilla gardening continues.

According to the above definition of 'guerrilla gardening' because I undertook this venture with out permission on property that did not belong to me it was a 'guerrilla' act, however as I now have the Mayor's blessing, I would say I have become a 'volunteer gardener' for the Boulevarden. : )

However, I am looking forward to engaging in future 'guerrilla' acts...or 'environmental graffiti' as the Boulevard was recently described.