Sheltering in Place

Montana Naturalist : Fall/Winter 2020

When it first hit, we thought of it as a wave. And we felt less guilty about not seeing our loved ones—because we weren’t supposed to. It was nearly March and the farm was already pulling us under, into the coming season: the dirt hinting at thaw, the seeds laid out and ready for starting, the new field to till. It was just our second year and uncertainty was not a new reality for us, for we had leapt, full-bodied into our goal, accepting all risk and dreaming of flowers. Whether virus or frost, it was and still is, all about biology.

We all moved around less and as the spring came on, I swear I could feel the earth breathe easier. The feeling left me hollow, the irony too sharp. Of course it would take a respiratory illness to clear the air.

So, we planted more food than we planned on, and hoped, that somehow, the flower business would grow, despite the nonessential nature of our work. As the days grew long and the heat hit, the roots grew deep and what we thought of as a wave became more of a tide. Long, drawn, rising and falling, all adrift; reality ever altered. I started to cry every time I saw someone I once hugged.

But the flowers bloomed in waves, nonetheless. First the tulips and narcissus, then the peonies, a flush of dandelion, ranunculus, dames rocket. Mustard, birdsfoot trefoil, cosmos . . . wild and cultivated. In the absence of the social life I’d known, I started collecting interactions between flower and other. My sister sharing photos of her roses. My son smelling lilacs. The smile in the eyes of my friend’s mother when she received a bouquet of tulips from my sanitized hand. The bees gathering pollen. Deer snatching stray daffodils. The surprising and fragrant weight of snapdragons filling my embrace.

Now we are thick in dahlias and zinnias, clover and bee balm. When I cut a bunch, the hummingbirds squeak and thrum around me, hover at my face, eye to eye. Blackbirds and chickadees rob the sunflowers. Honeybees and bumblebees, mason bees and flies—more pollinators than last year, more than I could ever count or identify. The most essential workers swirl and whirl around me and somehow, I feel held.