PHOTOGRAPH BY BARRY PETERSON AND BLAISE ENRIGHT
a crud, especially since I’ve never been
able to grow a sunflower as large as
that regal, stolen giant.
By 1980, I had become almost too
obsessed with gardening. Cultivating
my garden made me a fierce protector
of my plants, along with those of my
neighbours and public gardens, too.
Then came the brutal July of 2015. I
lost my health to one of those ferocious
hospital bacterias. I also lost the love
of my life, who changed her mind
about me after 38 years. We had to give
up our farm paradise on Salt Spring
Island, with its orchard and large gar-
den that I’d dream-fantasied into
existence when I was 17 years old.
In February 2019, once again a
lowly renter in Vancouver, my new
surgeon told me I was too far gone
to operate on a newly diagnosed
liver cancer. I had less than a 50 per
cent chance of surviving the year.
Not that I believed him, but the
thought of being shut down so sud-
denly made me consider the possi-
bility that it was my last spring.
I walked out of that doctor’s office,
angry at his rude dismissal, then
recognized how blue the sky was. It
hadn’t been that blue since I was 12
years old, when I scratched “There
are 287 kinds of blue” on the back of
my clothes dresser, along with the
name of a pretty young girl I knew
in Grade 6, so that neither would be
forgotten. And they weren’t, though
the dresser is long gone.WHAT A WEIRD SPRING we had in 2019,
such a crazy unleashing of blossoms. I
realized I had to pay attention to every
one of them. Then my heart specialist
decided to compete with my oncolo-
gist for the role of Doctor Doom. She
told me that my chances for another
spring were even slimmer.
My last flowers! The deranged flower
prowler was unleashed. At first I nabbed
them mostly with permission from
people’s yards, or off the boulevards.
My bedroom became thick with mag-
nolias, camellias, quince and crab-
apple. My brightest spring ever.Brian Brett on Salt
Spring Island, 2005.rd.ca 63