Midlife’s A Trip

Lessons from the Hell Strip

Posted on 02. Jun, 2008 by Karen in Misc

If you’re a city gardener like me, you know there’s no more challenging area to cultivate than the “hell strip”.  For those non-gardening readers, the hell strip is the area of soil between your front sidewalk and the street.  Typically this is owned by your municipality and gets little to no attention regular attention.  In addition, the hell strip gets exposed to drought conditions in summer, salt in the winter, blazing sun, deep shade and dog pee.  Make no mistake, the hell strip doesn’t get its name by accident.

Gardeners often adopt the hell strip as our own because we don’t want it to detract from the well-tended landscaping between the sidewalk and our homes.  I’ve adopted mine but there’s always some obstacle to my vision of what the hell strip should look like.  And because I live in a climate where the growing season is short, I tend to be pretty focused on making my vision of the hell strip into reality — and quick. 

Now my hell strip has a big maple tree on it so lots of shade.  But the tree has been an obstacle to my success in creating a lush hell strip.  The tree roots soak up all the nutrients so it was difficult to grow grass or anything else around the tree.  I planted vinca, a ground cover and now the grass is growing like gangbusters crowding out the new plants.   You may ask why I haven’t just said “Oh the hell with it!!”  

Well the reason I hang in there is because I have a vision.  A vision of an attractive hell strip.  So what do you do when something gets in the way of your vision?  Well here’s what I’ve done as it relates to my hell strip:

• I’m learning to view the tree as an opportunity to be a more creative gardener. 
• For inspiration, I took a walking tour of the hell strips in my neighborhood (just another way to enhance an already great walk).   
• What I saw on my walk started me thinking about using things other than plant material to beautify my hell strip — like rocks.
• I enlisted my brother’s help yesterday and he moved some plants around on the hell strip to start to accommodate my new vision.

As I lightened up on the hell in my hell strip, I experienced a shift in perspective that allowed me to tweak my vision.  When “shift happens”, the obstacle is minimized — in my case, the tree – and the opportunity grows.  So while my hell strip may not end up being the lush mini-garden of my first vision, it will be an attractive green space because I’ve allowed my vision to evolve. 

If there’s something in your life that’s blocking your vision, just consider how you can just work around it to achieve your goals?  Remember — shift can happen for you too.

Related posts:

1. What Fresh Hell Is This? — A 10 Year War in Iraq “What fresh hell is this” when a political candidate promises...
2. What Fresh Hell Is This? – The Diabolical Dad in Austria The third “What Fresh Hell Is This” award goes...
3. “What Fresh Hell Is This” Award – Vertigo The 2nd “What Fresh Hell Is This” award goes to...
4. Lessons from the Universe Revisited I originally wrote this post last spring as a...
5. “What Fresh Hell Is This” Award — The Obama Sock Monkey Doll The latest “what fresh hell is this” award goes to...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.