March 2020
In the early weeks of quarantine I have started a garden. So far it exists mostly as haphazard sketches on the back pages of an old grad-school notebook, and in the seeds I have started in my too-cold kitchen. I fret over my “babies,” even though the beds they will be planted in haven’t been built yet. I have started sunflowers indoors in willful disregard of the packet instructions to “sow directly.” It turns out that many of us are channeling our anxieties into gardening. Grow lights are sold out everywhere. My solution is to move the seedlings from room to room, tracking the weak March sun. When it’s time to divide them, I can’t bring myself to snip the delicate green stems.