The Greenhouse Odyssey: Three-Land Ho
By Lorraine Miller
Stunned. Shattered. Paralyzed. Petrified. Thrown for a loop. Stopped in my tracks. Set on my heels. Knocked on my tail.
No single word or phrase can describe my feelings when I received that eviction notice. It took a while to soak in. After almost 3 years, eminent domain brought me back to square one. I knew a little more about plants and a little more about business, but it didn’t matter much; I was homeless. My options seemed clear on one hand and muddy on the other. I could get a job. I thought about it. I couldn’t do it. I could find another building to rent and move the shop. That seemed like an expensive effort at moving sideways. Other choices were unimaginable. That is to say, I couldn’t imagine any.
But in the back of my head, I heard a steady drumbeat: forge ahead, forge ahead, forge ahead.
During my visits to growers in California, I fell in love with greenhouses. The warm, moist air and the smell of the earth and growing things are transformative. I don’t write poetry, but being in a greenhouse moves you in that way. It’s Nature. I found new sources for foliage plants. I also discovered growers of exoAcs: epiphytes, bromeliads, orchids, succulents, and cactus. I learned how these plants were grown and unintentionally learned how the greenhouses operated.
I fell in love with cactus. God help me! Walking into a greenhouse with nothing but cactus is tantamount to walking into Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.
Neat rows of bright colors, perfectly symmetrical, some as hairy as dogs and some as bald as the proverbial cucumber. The cactus growers liked to use redwood flats to grow seeds rather than the plasAc flats we use now. There was broad agreement among them that cactus roots appreciate the acidity of the redwood and, therefore, grow faster. As the seeds sprout and grow, they push or squeeze against one another, forcing the whole flat of thumb-sized cactus to push upwards, so while their roots are all attached to the redwood slat, the plants are up in the air. It’s called a ‘bubble flat. The thumblings are separated and replanted in new flats in rows 12x12. Once again, the cactus ‘bubble up.’ They are ready for a 2” pot. With a short time to get ‘established’ in the pot, they're ready for market. Given the Southern California weather, the plants grow all year, and most greenhouses don’t require heating systems. The little plants grow quickly. I was gobsmacked!
In my initial trips, cactus growers raised 6” plants or larger outside, like they were a field crop. Of course, they were at sea level, so the cacti wouldn’t sunburn like they would at our Utah elevation. I walked up and down the rows with the grower and his shovel. He dug up the ones I pointed to. Later, one of the workers would come out and gather the plants, bundle them in newspapers, and pack them in a cardboard box for me to plant in a pot when I got home.
I was taken in with all of this: the greenhouses, the green plants, the succulents, the dirt under my fingernails, the spines in my fingertips, the whole plant world, but to be clear, it never entered my mind that I could have it.
Maybe some magic did come into my life, but I prefer to think of it as Grace, a gift from the Universe, unasked for and perhaps undeserved. It was Grace and my brother, Danny, who got me through. In the midst of my despair, Dan called. He’d seen a piece of property for sale on 20th East, and because it was zoned commercial, he thought I might be interested. They were having an Open House so I drove over. When I parked in front of the small house, I could see several people in the living room, so I decided to wait to go in. Instead, I walked down the driveway to the back.
That Backyard! Holy Hothouse! I couldn’t believe my eyes!
It was at least 50’ wide and over 100’ deep, more than enough space for a commercial greenhouse. I stared at the backyard like it was hallowed ground. How can this be? This is not what I expected, but it’s certainly what I wanted. I didn’t have a plan, just an image: a greenhouse full of cactus.
There must be a thin line between intuition and insanity.
My ‘just compensation’ from the school board equaled the amount I needed for a down payment on the 20th. I don’t remember the exact timing of receiving a check from the school board and writing one to the mortgage company, but there must have been a lag because I remember many evenings parking across the street at the 7-11 and studying the house. Did it have a bathroom? I couldn’t recall a kitchen.
I kept the Grass Menagerie open until the last minute. Before the bulldozers rumbled in, I took down the signage, the light shades, and anything else that might be useful on 20th East.
I put the cash register and the open sign in the van, and I put the key in the lock. It seemed like a bitter end to a happy era. But it was not a hopeless ending.