A handful of goth teenagers spent the better part of the afternoon slowing drinking down pitchers of juice and alcohol concoctions while perched in a tree next to my garden. Annoyed with the breach of peace and beauty, I resigned myself to the fact that this was going to be part of the community in community gardening at Col. Summers Park. Part of the deal. At first I found their tedious, loud, and in every way, awkward announcements and flirtations with each other almost unbearable. But then I found myself obsessed with them. An hour later, their ambient chatter had taken me down memory lane, back to junior high and high school. Not that I spent high school drunk in an elm tree. It was something more universal than that. I remembered when my best friend, Jody, and I got ourselves kicked out of Mr. Gorchel’s chemistry class so that we could sit in the bleachers and watch football practice in the beautiful fall light. I remembered hanging out at the laundromat in downtown Gaston at 1AM with Erin Coffee. Doing nothing. Just kicking our heels against the driers. We were waiting and being at the same time. In that empty laundromat, we had our lives ahead of us. We had time to kill. Every moment was charged with anticipation of the next and at the same time, every moment was complete.
I’d stopped gardening. Who knows how much time had passed. I realized I’d been sitting on the edge of one of my raised beds, in the sun, just sipping tea and remembering. I decided to plant two rows of carrot seeds, and call it a day. Most of the goth kids took off about the same time. But one was pretty bad off and when I left he was tossing and turning in the muddy field, clenching his pitcher of juice, saying something about wanting a song for his birthday. His friend, a very large girl dressed in black with magenta hair, sat next to him as he rocked back and forth, and told him he’d be okay.
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