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Inside The Garden Walls, Saint Thomas, ON (2026)

06/23/2026

"I know when you have been working in the darkness, every leaf and flower stares back at your image, and every flower stands proud as you make yourself soft wisps that streak the sky, or the large bold ones who cast a a quick moving shadow across the earth. Dark and loud, the thunderstorms whose anger never lasts, you are mighty and you forgive. You decide who will have their rain overflowing, or a few drops at a time.
Will you channel the rain as a river, or a brief frantic dance, or a thick water teeming curtain that blocks the garden view for a few minutes, or a tantrum of clear glass hail that will not stay. Will the rain howl and writhe in the strong arms of a fierce wind born of a tornado, water that has no head nor tail, but alive in the darkness of a black summer afternoon? Will you spackle each leaf with a watery mist, or will you shake each flower with fat raindrops who bully my roses almost to the ground? They forgive, they always forgive." - "Clouds", Crystal Trojek

06/20/2026

Betty

I love small flowered clematis. I don’t find them very often on my plant shopping excursions. Sometimes I settle for nothing, leaving large flowered relatives partying on a greenhouse bench, their green fingers happily hand in hand amongst their newfound friends. Clematis love unconditionally, gratefully hugging every plant they see, and any other object it discovers on its garden travels. They hold friends close on hard days, laugh with friends on great days, keep their feet in the shade and their heads in the sun and they are grateful all their lives.

Many years ago, when rural life was ours, we had a gazebo that overlooked a sea of grass and my two acre field of flowers. Those blooms travelled across the field to the old to***co barn that never imagined rows and rows of colourful garden memories drying in the rafters. The dried flowers eventually headed for my floral design studio, multicoloured bunches journeyed to the market on not yet sun lit mornings. I can still see the old barn doors wide open on mid summer days, the swallows darting in and out, the sun quietly reaching for my flowers through the cracks between the old barn boards, the particular soundless comforting scent of dust and straw, timeless old that lived in the soft darkness there. An occasional breeze visited from the fields, when it wasn’t busy tickling the rising corn or soy beans, perhaps the land missed the old horse harnesses that still hung empty on the wall. Rain danced happily on the metal roof, singing to the drying flowers. My clematis viticella bore little blue flowers, their little blue faces watched the flower field. It climbed. Sadly when we left that garden, the new owners decapitated the gazebo at the ground, dragged its wooden remains onto the flower field, and burned it. I wept.

A couple of years ago on a July day when sales whispered ‘one more trip to the garden centre’, when the summer heat suggested do not stay too long. Wandered off to one last thing: the picked over bedraggled remnants still lounging on the clematis bench. There is a small flowered lavender girl, ‘Betty Corning’. Quick internet visit for basic details. Betty looks a lovely thing, of the viticella clematis group, discovered in 1932 (I like old stuff), and she is purple (which is a sign). Betty looked a bit raggedy, I carefully untwined her from her comrades, explaining her new best friend would be an old garden gate. Betty took the gate seriously, explored the top bar first and travelled to the rest of its extremities, all the while peppering the gate with little purple flowers. Betty was delightful, purely delightful until the frosts came and we parted.

This spring I looked for my clematis friends, stealthily climbing from beds of old brown leaves, or sprouting new born buds on their adult vines. Betty was not there. It’s just late, she will come. She did not. I planted dahlias, annuals, bought more roses as compensation attempting to ignore the niggling fear that she was gone. I threw a handful of fertilizer at Betty just in case she needed more inspiration to rise. A month later I knew clematis grief, ‘Violet Elizabeth’ who came home with Betty, climbed above my head on a nearby obelisk. I wondered if she missed Betty. The frenzy of rose pruning, laying down multiple yards of mulch, seeking one small vine crawling up from my garden of yesterday, no Betty. She’s not coming back. My husband’s calm response, “Get another one.” Returned to several garden centres, returned to point of purchase, no Betty to be had. Bought another clematis, as compensation.

A few days ago I was in the garden at an early hour as I often am, with my camera, Merlin counting birds as I count flower buds. End of May and into June is flower time, they are coming in numbers. Hats replace socks. Scent rises, drifting across your path before you see the owner, an opening flower smiling back as you meet for the first time under the just risen sun. It is a magical time in the garden, when one feels home again. I walk near that old rusty gate found at a farm sale, still upright on two old posts, visiting Betty’s grave. Just there at its rusty foot rises a thin green vine, with delicate leaves, two stems. Betty. I admit I choked back tears. Betty has climbed a good three feet this week, ambitious she is. Clematis viticella, Betty Corning, she is purple, she is back, and she fine.

Crystal Trojek
June 2026

06/20/2026

Sundial

Everyone who has a garden leaves a piece of themselves there. Everybody.

I think when I was being created the lid fell off the jar of gardening genes and instead of a politely shared sprinkle, I got the whole jar. My parents knew this, they delegated gardening jobs my way until I married and had my own garden.

My parents were avid yard salers, my Dad foraging for whatever he thought one of his kids and then grandkids needed, and my Mum hunted for garden gnomes. My Dad hated gnomes, but my Mum loved them and adopted every one she found. Big, little, happy, angry, sad, old, tired and been through the wars gnomes, my Mum bought it. Dad’s job was to perk up their clothing, sort out new eyes, and putting them wherever Mum said they were going. They dotted my Mum’s garden, smelled roses, watched neighbours, sat on and hung over walls, played by the pond, looked for goldfish, and I can still see Mum sitting in the shade, calmly puffing on a cigarette and admiring them all, the laundry quietly swinging in the summer breeze nearby.
My Dad called me up one summer day and said to stop round when I am in town, “I’ve got something for you.” It was about my birthday, and I can see him standing on the driveway, wearing that pair of “gardening shorts” and “gardening shoes”, that my Mum kept threatening to throw out. (I guess my Dad had a garden uniform long before a garden retailer thought about having one) I followed him into the semi darkness of his old garage, through to the little workshop area he had in the back, and there he proudly introduced me to a sundial. “I thought you’d want it. I’ve given it a paint job and it’s ready to go.” He smiled, and I did too. I never knew how valuable that sun dial would become, better than any investment you can name.

The sundial has lived in a few different gardens now, and the sun has burned its face as the winter storms have scraped Dad’s paint from it. Snow and rain, I like to see it from the window every day. This year the sundial has columbines for friends, who shared their flowers right under its nose, the bees dropped pollen on its worn face, ferns cover its feet, my curly willow gracefully winds itself above its head, and one of my vintage lights spreads a soft glow over it in the darkness of every summer night. I noticed last week some fireflies were dancing on it.

I can see the sundial from the window, still there. I still sometimes look at it for a moment, and from my heart the tears push their way out of my eyes. I think of that day from years ago now, and I see my Dad’s strong hands painting the sundial. I don’t cry every time I meet it, sometimes I just smile, and keep watering. The top is inscribed, “Time passes, memories remain”. I never thought about those words when I put it in the car that day for more than ten seconds. I spend ten minutes thinking about it now Dad’s gone. I’ll never paint it, ever.

crystal trojek 2019

06/18/2026

Lawns

When you are a child the lawn is always large, perfect, and basically taken for granted. Ours was halved by a cement sidewalk that marched up the centre to the front step leading to the front door we rarely used. Framed on one side by the single driveway, the other side was edged with a bed of peonies and a white picket fence, the lawn twins were often littered with bicycles and tricycles that belonged to us and other kids who grew up on our little dead end street. I remember some parts of the lawn were decorated with clover, patiently searched on summer days for four leaf ones which were rarely found. Honey bees were often perusing those clover patches, observed (if you were lucky) and wisely avoided by kids.

My Dad was proud of his old second hand Lawn Boy mower. He often remarked it was older than me in those days. It surely must have been one of the first gas mowers made in the early 1950’s, perhaps its rightful place was in a lawnmower museum. The wheels were large, the cover was large and somehow reminded me of a sturdy green space ship. Lawn Boy was loud, belching black smoke as Dad and then one of my brothers not so happily pushed it around the yard. I remember it was heavy, often tipped on its side to reveal wads of wet grass liberally caked inside, the blades needing to be removed and sharpened. Every spring Dad headed off to the “lumber yard” down the street for a new spark plug. Mum always commented he might be gone for two hours if he met someone he knew which he often did. I still remember his annual victorious spring shout to my Mum, the neighbours, and possibly nearby strangers from the midst of a huge and menacing cloud of black smoke, “IT’S RUNNING AGAIN!!!”. I sometimes wondered if my Mum wished it wouldn’t.

The lawn was never specifically watered in the depths of summer to keep it green. The sprinkler was a metal water spinning miracle on a hot summer day, no one cared if the water was ice cold, kids lapped up the unhealthy water from the sprinkler, laughing, shrieking and gulping. We quickly forgave the sprinkler for winging feet, fingers, or toes by jumping higher over its spray onto the soaked and flattened grass. Those types of sprinklers inhabit antique malls now. They probably still work.

I never recall the lawn ever being fertilized, or the appearance of weeds being discussed. That old lawnmower rattled and chugged its way around small swimming pools, chewed pieces of willow tree scattered in the back garden, sat smoking and idling while Dad threatened us about removing the tent from its path. I think a couple of times Mum lamented to no one in particular the possible result of the thick black smoke floating through the once clean laundry drying on the clothesline.

My father kept that old Lawn Boy mower on its pins until the mid 1970’s, and then one day I stopped by their present home and its replacement had taken up residence in his garage. There was a definite tinge of sadness in Dad’s voice as he talked about Lawn Boy’s last smoky breaths, “they don’t make them like that anymore”. I don’t think he ever believed they would part company.

I drove over and parked on the little street where I grew up a few years ago. The maple tree Dad planted on the front lawn is large now and covers most of it, its shade does not recall the thin sapling that was once a spindly twig on the front lawn, sometimes hidden in the smoke of that old Lawn Boy mower. I can still see my Father standing on the driveway on a sunny spring morning, young, and a foot placed on the wide deck of the Lawn Boy, a strong pull on that old rope cord that spun it into life, and I can hear him shouting,”IT’S RUNNING AGAIN.”. Yes, I can still hear and see it. Yes I can, and we own a Lawn Boy.

Crystal Trojek
February 2022

06/14/2026

The Father's Day story, 2024. Grateful for the memory, my garden has many words growing there amongst the flowers.
Spiders
I have had a life long fear of spiders. My Mum always said it was because I was bitten in the eye when I was very young, swelling became so bad I was taken to the doctor, which was rare for any of us as my Mum had a great fear of hospitals. Mum said I would never forget about that spider, I shivered when she talked about the spider plants in her garden. I used to dream of them being full of spiders when I walked past in the early morning, jumping from the depths of the green leaves and flowers on my bare legs and feet. I reached the street by another path, which I hoped was spider less. Spider nightmares have visited me for many years.
I love the springtime in my garden, spiders are tiny little things, newborn and struggling with their first tiny webs, itty bitty babies in numbers, perhaps birds eat a lot of them. I like to think so, even though I know spiders enjoy eating bugs. I still check ceilings for spiders, if I am home alone extensions are invaluable, and I pray spider cannot get out of the vacuum cleaner. I fear the garden shed, the webs of residents are thick and many on the windows and in the corners. My Grandsons know that nana does not want to see their pet spiders.
When autumn arrives in my garden, I pray for frost, hard frost. The days of walking in a dream near and amongst the flowers and plants, enjoying its wonders and promises of today and tomorrow are over. I spend much less time concentrating on photos, I thank God every dew washed morning when large webs are outlined in the first light of autumn days. Large spiders live there, very large spiders. Fast spiders, spiders looking to leave their kin behind them for next years garden. They are the spiders that haunt me, still.
I think now my Dad used to sing me a little song quite often for a long time when I was afraid. It was a mere handful of words ripe with imagination, a handful of notes sung by his father many years ago. The spider was washed away and some of us will always recall that funny little tune that told of the sad story of a hapless spider who never learned to swim but he also never learned to give up. I thought of that rhyme, my Dad singing it a couple of weeks ago, when a rose picture revealed a little resident spider just resting (or sleeping) (or stalking) from the heart of a lovely deep pink Gallica rose on a perfect spring morning. It had rained the night before, perhaps spider was glad of a little fresh drink, I do not know if spiders get thirsty.
I can hear my Dad singing that spider tune in the garden to me, working in the garden with a shovel or a pair of clippers or grass trimmers. Dad used to sing the spider song in the car on fine spring days, smiling and laughing if he missed a word, when the window was rolled down and a little spring breeze flew inside to seal the memory of the finest of moments with me. Spider in my garden last week was small, but the memory he (or she) chose to leave in the rising sunshine was large. Others must know the rhyme, it’s probably still travelling around, like the memories of my Father.
Inky Dinky spider climbed up the water spout,
Down came the rain and washed the spider out.
Out came the sun and dried up all the water
And Inky Dinky spider went up the spout again.
Crystal Trojek
Father’s Day 2024

06/14/2026

The Lantern
There it was, abandoned, an old rusty old paint slightly broken door cast iron lantern. Straddling the grass filled earth, door slightly ajar, a small piece of sturdy pipe yet attached. Pipe was lantern’s steady feet, keeping it upright in the world of someone’s garden, pipe was a friend on which you could count in all weathers. Weary lantern, perhaps one too many attempts to make paint stick, paint dropping off in the winter months, summer baked into wandering flakes. Rust grew, more and more, rust was healthy and greedy for the lantern's flesh. An overhead cloud passed quickly, lantern slept on in the sunlight.
I imagined lantern young and pretty, its rustless paint sparkling in the sunshine while the puppy sniffed the lantern’s grass. I could imagine flowers growing up, stretching by its six faces. I could see bird looking inside lantern, perhaps considering a nesting place. I could see the rain dropping on it, water dripping from its face, the snow picking at its rust, snow flying through the open windows and through its little door. I thought of how many springs it might have begged come near. I thought of it frost crusted on an autumn morning. I wondered what roads lantern had travelled, its birthplace, where it fondly called home. Had it captured light and snow and autumn leaves in a singular garden, or several. Lantern was silent, lost and weary, broken and old, waiting for the garbage pickup in the morning. Lantern was warm and rough in my hand, I carried it home.
Husband added an iron stand. “Painted?” “No, I like it blistered, peeling and rusting, lantern is strong.” Today the morning light was born once more, filtering through the rusty lantern, searching for the newborn face of a rose. A multitude of buds were anxious to spread scent of roses, in a brief moment as light lands softly on an opening rose, lantern whispered. I remembered such a morning long ago, watching my father with a cultivator, ripping the soil in my mother’s little rose bed. A triangle of roses scented her garden, wandered across the little patio, a singular bloom occasionally scented the kitchen. I remember my father working steadily, scraping and scratching the earth, gathering the stricken weeds. I can see the roses shivering, the cold water dancing on their green leaves in the bright sunlight, that old rubber garden hose guiding along a brass nozzle. I could see the water droplets wiggling on the rose faces.
A cardinal whistles from the cherry tree, the heart of the lantern darkens as the sun moves higher, the rose breathes deeply on this present June morning, exhaling the sweetness of today. Roses, on Father’s Day morning. I remember, old lantern, time passes, memories remain.
Crystal Trojek
June, 2025

06/12/2026

Graham Thomas
‘Graham Thomas’ Austin rose has been living in my front garden for a few years. I have doubted him, his yellow self who rises in the spring air, leafs out once more as he sends his golden rose buds towards the sun while opening his eyes to look at a bright blue sky. Graham T. stands almost in the centre of the garden, sheltered and close to a Japanese maple that I wrapped for many winters, both now survive on their own.
Each spring when I wander amongst the wreckage of last years garden, when the snow is creeping into the thawing ground, when the wind still bites of cold once in a while and the next day the sun robustly cries ‘let us go’, I usually find one small length of a green cane that is the heart of Graham T., a scrap of the memory of what once was. Just one, slightly hidden amongst old leaves, dreaming of last summer, reluctant to look for sunshine again this year. I have wondered if Graham T. is lazy or a kind of rose that lives for a grand entrance when everyone else doubts. He does.
Graham T. has chosen to walk out, from a green sprig of a few weeks ago. He is a yellow rose who sails happily on the light and fair winds of spring that bring him home again to me, prepared to spend the golden days of summer as he wishes. He will sail amongst the plants in my garden until frost bids him sail no more, and until then he smiles, in yellow.
Crystal Trojek
June 2024

06/07/2026

The Rose Ladder

There’s a ladder in my garden, an old ladder. The hinges are decorative cast, metal scrolls that would never be found on
today’s aluminum ladders. This wooden ladder has journeyed
far from a little hardware store, its first home where the owner
knew most everyone who ever came into the store and where everything was, without a computer. Not one item in that hard-
ware store had a product code, and most of them had a price applied with a pencil.

This ladder is not so strong these days, its joints are a bit loose,
it is old. It has the marks of age, scrapes, goudges, scratches, splashes of paint, and its finish is gone, the shiny face it once
wore when it was new. One could doubt its capacity to firmly
carry one up its steps to cut tree branches, or clean windows.
The ladder is here and not so much here, all at the same time.

I have three old ladders in my garden, one is the friend of the
clematis called ‘Polish Spirit’. It has been here the longest, and
a nearby rose has also warmed to its presence. They happily
share the ladder.

The second ladder is fully open, anchored to the ground with a couple of pieces of rusty rebar. The wind doesn’t like its location,
but my Austin rose ‘A Shropshire Lad’ loves it. The ladder is
friendly, does not mind rain in summer or snow in winter piled
up to the highest step. The top of this ladder is a waiting place
for birds, waiting their turn at the bird feeders. It is warm in
the sun there, and roaming cats cannot climb up through the
rose brambles.

There is a partial old barn ladder in the back garden. Some it had met with an accident, its length was shortened but its red paint
and worn wooden rungs still rise from the ground up to the floor
of the upper deck. A burgundy rose is climbing it now, ‘Night Owl’. The Owl was reticent about the ladder the first year, but now, the Owl has decided to cover it. The bars are good places to tie the
rose to prevent the new canes from being whipped by the wind
during a summer thunderstorm, or being broken by a winter storm comprised of an unruly band of vicious snowflakes and ice pellets.

This ladder is near one of my garden chairs, a place to sit out of the rain amongst my garden inhabitants. The birds come and go, the sun rises and gently sprays the new light of day over the back garden. It paints the rose brightly, and the old ladder. The ladder looks new, bright, cheerful, happy, and new.

It is a ladder with a home, and a purpose.

Crystal Trojek
July 2021

06/06/2026

Doubt

Pruning roses is hard, and painful. I don’t like doing it.

It has been a hard winter in my garden, we have been discussing if the results this spring are from too much heat and drought last year, or rabbits, or a polar vortex that arrived when they should have been long gone until next winter. I have had to resolve myself to the fact that I must do much cutting, dead wood serves no good purpose to roses. It’s also depressing to look at day after day. I have purchased new pruners, sharp and lively they are. Mixing buckets of water soluble fertilizer, dumping each pail on rose feet. Ground is dry already. Scattering water soluble fertilizer to tempt rose roots with a healthy snack. Hoping for growth and blooms like no other year, I have great expectations.

I remember each rose as it looked last May, the time of year when disease has not yet discovered its leaves, insects have not yet defoliated rose canes. I imagined how the rose looked covered with green buds, how often I checked each one for the first sign of colour, the way the first rose looked as it begin to open on the finest of spring mornings. I dreamt of how rose perfume sometimes came hunting me, when the dawn was fine and new, and the scent of that first rose stepped out into my garden wandering the earth, young and cheerful. I clipped dry canes away from roses, the ones with multiple rose hips left behind. I imagined the canes struggling to hold all the blooms, how the rain filled roses drenched in a spring shower reached for the earth. Upside down they were, they danced a little, swaying in that fresh bathed breeze that follows the rain when everything is clean once more.

I have left some of the larger canes for further thought, distributing time for more signs of sprouting rose leaves. There are some thick, gnarled rose branches that I do not like to sever with the loppers, but I must. I thin rose branches that have been knit and purled together, all ready a green blanket without rose embellishments. It will come. I remember ‘The Crocus” will send them in deep shades of cream. A break from pruning roses came, the new roses have arrived at the garden centres. The air is still winter scorned, but the sun shines brightly scoring the air with warmth. The roses stand waiting for adoption. I choose three more Austins, because I doubt the strength of a few of the roses I have in my garden to survive. I fear I shall not see them again. We visit a few other garden centres, early shoppers get the best selection. I buy two more roses. All of them wait for me on the lower deck.

It is almost three weeks later, one rose waits to find the ground in my garden. In between May planting and moving, we have been blessed with two good rains that deliver fertilizer to the winer worn roses. They rise. The canes spring into the warming air, in multitudes. They soar daily for the skies, I ask for forgiveness that I doubted their rose hearts. The leaves stretch and yawn by the light of the moon and the deep and pleasant care of the sun. Each new day more roses awake, they are coming, they are coming for me in June. They are coming in numbers, the tiny green buds are peeping out amongst the leaves. I purchased one rose named ‘Amberness’ this year who already carried flowers, because it called my name as I was passing by, shivering in a cold breeze that searched the garden centre nursery for those unprepared for yet cool temps. I sometimes wonder if the label is true, ‘Amberness; says this is so in her case. I wandered into one greenhouse, a new clematis hopped easily on to my cart. I went back for the sweet rose, and purchased a floribunda companion.

Today I have my camera with me, documenting the spring garden for the grey winter days when I forget what lies sleeping out there under inches of snow beyond a frosted window. The winter days are long, pictures of yesterday and tomorrow comfort those who remember the lost and provide hope for tomorrow. Today ‘Amberness’ does not speak of the ravages of winter, but of the sweetness of spring. It’s perfume wanders around my garden, and covers me. The roses have returned, they have returned for me once more, even though I thought they were lost. Wait another week or two, rose miracles happen in the garden.

Crystal Trojek
MaY 2026

06/05/2026

Who remembers these plants? Who still grows them?

Cleome
I purchased another plant today, after I said I was done this year. I bought four of them, because they were quads. I happened to notice the truck being unloaded at the market the previous afternoon, the plant racks glistening in the sunshine, layered with green and many other cheerful colours. I happened to be going for my weekly grocery shopping adventure the very next morning. I had to drive right by, and the roses I was awaiting to be marked down were not. I might not get one after all, kind of disappointed. I also said I wasn’t buying more roses once this year and bought two more a couple of weeks ago, because they were 30% off. I take that as clear direction, and I obey.
I vacillated about which lane I should be in, (maybe I should just go straight home) only one other person was looking at those fresh plants, and into the parking lot I went.
Covid 19 has forced all of us to enjoy a close relationship with arrows of all sizes, kinds and colours, walking head down everywhere you go. I still wonder when I will bump into somebody, or witness the human (again) who really vehemently has a problem with arrows, signage, and lacks patience of any kind. About to leave the market and be sensible, no strawberries in yet (I felt that was my legitimate visit excuse), I glanced at a shelf of smart and tidy looking seedlings, clean and green, grasping the June air, reaching for the next shelf. Four inches of profound memories in a cell pack. They spoke.
“They’re spider plants, that’s what they’re called.” I leaned slowly back from the large spheres of blooms, holding my breath, away from the arching stems that stretched towards my face, almost touching my arms, hands, shoulders, and shirt. Just seconds before, I had been a little tanned kid sitting crosslegged on the crumbly cracked sidewalk that divided the cleome from the ferns against the house. Quickly brushed off once clean shorts, checked legs, feet and sandals to make sure a spider was not on me. I do not like spiders, any size, shape, or colour, especially on me. Quickly combing my hair with small dirty fingers, I messed up that home perm Mum and one of her friends gave me last week. Mum was still standing on the patio in the July sunshine, huge recently empty wicker wash basket on her hip, empty peg basket trying to escape from said wash basket, clothesline full. (as usual)
I can still see my slightly green little kid fingers, peeling open green seed pods, light yellow unripe seeds, remember the scent of them, the dew thick on the leaves of the enormous cleome plants. I can still see and feel the dryness of the brown seed pods, the little seeds raining down on the autumn garden, the way they danced on the tired soil, the morning coolness of the late summer air, seed pods dangling like silent wind chimes, some of them empty.
There are many seeds in many gardens all over the world, ripening and prepared to become plants many months later, prepared to share their many storied histories years later. Time is their most patient master, their souls embedded as particles of dust, but they are not. They are the memories that never say the words out loud, they just are.

crystal trojek June 2020

Inside The Garden Walls

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