Going Straight

You're a romantic at heart, and you want your garden to feel soft and flowy, so you're absolutely positive you want curved beds, an undulating margin of lawn, and a gently meandering pathway. Nope, no straight lines or hard edges for you, right?!

Right?

Actually, straight edges may be the best way to make your garden complement your home. After all, isn't the biggest, most significant element on your property… your house? And no matter what style it is—rancher, Tudor, Eichler, Codder—it's got straight edges. So when your garden reflects and extends those lines out into the landscape, you visually anchor your house to its site.

Furthermore, straight lines are the essence of practicality in the garden. If you're working with small spaces, you can arrange elements far more efficiently using straight edges rather than curves (think of the contents of your refrigerator: do cylindrical bottles or rectangular items nest together better)? Even rectilinear furniture is more efficient: a 4' x 4' square table, for instance, allows 16 square feet of dining space, while a 4' diameter round table only offers 12-1/2 square feet of surface area within the same envelope. And when it comes to lawn, it's just plain easier to mow in straight lines than follow irregular curves.

All this isn't to say that your yard has to look like a checkerboard or feel like a prison cell. Even if you used nothing but straight lines, you still can install plants that drape and billow over the edges, and use irregular planting patterns and varying shapes. And if you're fortunate enough to have property that "goes wild" at the edges—whether adjoining a natural open space or a neighbor's naturalistic garden—it actually makes sense to loosen up your bed edges on that side, for a smooth transition that takes full advantage of borrowed views. And if your yard is asymmetrical or unbalanced, or has a particular trouble spot, curves can actually be used to advantage, to distract the eye past the offending area.

Don't get me wrong: I've designed plenty of gardens based on curved lines, including one that was almost nothing but curves. Even in a starkly modernist garden, arcs provide necessary counterpoints to all that rectilinearity. But even if your style is as far from straight as can be, don't make yourself a prisoner to curves. Often, going straight is the best way to go.

A Bug In The System

And we thought Y2K was going to be bad. In the last 24 hours I've lost my Mac due to an illogical logic board, and now my email due to a power outage wherever those email servers serve emails. Dammit, people, I'm workinghere!

Actually, it's ironic because I've recently moved away from hand drafting and begun doing most, if not all, my work using CAD. So the project I was going to finish up this week is now sitting in the hands of an Apple Genius somewhere, who undoubtedly doesn't appreciate the intricacies of my work. And the email notification from the aforementioned Apple Genius, informing me I may have my repaired computer back? It's sitting in limbo somewhere, feeling unloved.

Technology. Now helping you waste more time than ever.

Garden workout

We all know that spending some quality time in the garden, even if it's not quite power gardening, is good for the soul. But it can also be surprisingly good for the body.

For instance, a half-hour of digging and tilling can burn 200 calories. The same time spent trimming shrubs manually can burn about 180 calories, as can weeding a garden bed. Raking leaves for 30 minutes: 160 calories. Mowing with a push mower: 240 calories per half-hour. And my personal favorite, turning a compost pile, will burn about 250 calories in 30 minutes (although I simply can't imagine going at it for that long, myself).

It's worth mentioning, though, that it's all too easy to overexert yourself, because most of these activities are low-load/high repetition. So while the first few whacks with the hedge shears seem like nothing, after minute 30 you've probably earned a couple of Advil. Ease into it with these tips:

Start slowly, if you haven't been exercising regularly. Build up to longer times and heavier chores.

Warm up and stretch muscles before, during, and after gardening.

Take care of your back and knees by bending at the knees, not the waist, to keep your back straight when shoveling or lifting, and by using long-handled tools and knee pads.

It's easy to forget, in this era of leaf blowers and power tillers and soil drills, how enjoyable the physical aspects of gardening can be. Take advantage of the next dry, clear day to get back in touch.

Front Yard, Back Yard

Why do we landscape? Sure, we love the color or scent of flowers, or the tickle of lawn between our toes. We want a place to sit and chat, or sit and rest, or run around and play. But deep down in our lizard brains, what really compels us to move the earth around and poke plants into it?

The answer, I suspect, depends on where we landscape. The fact is, most of us landscape our front yard for our neighbors, and the back yard for ourselves. The front yard is the "curb appeal," the "first impression," the "look at me" statement. All of these are externally driven by the opinions of other people, and reflect our insecure little ego's need to either blend in or stand out. I've worked with home owners who wanted their front yards to have the same, boring patch of lawn with a flower bed border that their neighbors up and down the street have; "we don't want to be the weird yard on the street," they told me. I've also worked with people who didn't want their yard to be anything like their neighbors'; for these people the front is the chance to express their individuality to the world, presumably for the world's amazement and approval.

If the front yard seeks the approval that will satisfy the ego, then the back yard is governed by the id's need for pleasure and immediate gratification. The current trend toward lavish outdoor rooms, replete with televisions and dishwashers, indicates a certain unwillingness to endure any discomfort or delay, as well as a wish to wring every drop of enjoyment out of the yard. I've noticed that more clients are willing to pay a premium for larger size plants (and more water to sustain them) to make the brand new landscape look established. And built-in grill centers certainly offer a sense of fulfillment that the humber Weber kettle doesn't.

There are lots of gray areas here — the overdone outdoor room is as much a monument to the self (ego) as a pleasuredome, and those mature plants are being installed in the front yard as well as the back. And I'm not passing judgment on any of it: we all have our desires and needs — I think we may all be human — and there's no wrong answer when it comes to expressing ourselves. There are even online quizzes to tell us whether we're an "ego" or an "id," but I wouldn't depend on that to define the style of your garden.

Nevertheless, it is fun to ponder: which matters more to you right now, your front yard or the back? Can you identify why? There's a field called design psychology that uses psychological insights as a tool for developing the design program (often to help home sellers discover the wishes of home buyers). But don't overlook that the landscape itself can be a place that drives, not just reflects, your mental state: therapeutic or healing gardens can provide sanctuary that helps you, not just your garden, grow. Either way, begin with an understanding of yourself… a truly unique and personal yard will result.

The Great American Desert

"When the native sod of the Great Plains was in place, it did not matter if people looked twice at a piece of ground. Wind blew twenty, thirty, forty miles an hour, as always. Droughts came and went. Prairie fires, many of them started deliberately by Indians or cowboys trying to scare nesters off, took a great gulp of grass in a few days. Hailstorms pounded the land. Blue northers froze it so hard it was like broken glass to walk on. Through all of the seasonal tempests, man was inconsequential. As long as the weave of grass was stitched to the land, the prairie would flourish in dry years and wet. The grass could look brown and dead, but beneath the surface, the roots held the soil in place; it was alive and dormant. The short grass, buffalo and blue grama, had evolved as the perfect fit for the sandy loam of the arid zone. It could hold moisture a foot or more below ground level even during summer droughts, when hot winds robbed the surface of all water-bearing life. In turn, the grass nurtured pin-tailed grouse, prairie chickens, cranes, jackrabbits, snakes, and other creatures that got their water from foraging on the native turf. Through the driest years, the web of life held. When a farmer tore out the sod and then walked away, leaving the land naked, however, that barren patch posed a threat to neighbors. It could not revert to grass, because the roots were gone. It was empty, dead, and transient."

—Timothy Egan, The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl

Read this book.