Horticultural Therapy and Design

Love it and hate it. Too little land...too much land. Privacy that can't be achieved...too much privacy that needs to be achieved. Not enough space for more plants...too much space that needs more plants. Just what is the happy medium? I've experienced living and gardening in a condo, on 8 acres, then a postage-stamp subdivision lot, and now 1 acre. I'm still not completely happy. Is it  the expense of buying so much more plants, soil, compost, and mulch? The need to create more "designed" spaces, and consequently buy hardscape material, because "something is missing"? Because I'd rather be gardening rather than cleaning the garden? I've always believed that a prospective homebuyer should hire me to evaluate the cost involved in maintaining or creating a landscape: boy, would I change his or her mind, one way or the other! One just doesn't think about how much more expense it will be to tackle that slope, or to add irrigation pipe and valves, or that a visually-pleasing cluster of boulders often means there's much more of it below the surface -- and that's NOT going to be pleasing at planting or building time! I call this my "spring blues" for it is now that I experience the burden of having too much land...and all the work and money that comes with it. And then, the sun comes out. The wild flowers surface that I didn't plant. The natural tall green grass is so gorgeous after a rain (and for now, I consciously dismiss all the mowing and weed-wacking I'll have to do in a month or two). The gentle swaying of the towering ponderosas and grey pines in the wind against the blues skies is priceless, especially coming from the city (no doubt I'll be cursing their fallen needles come next winter). So I sit here in my office, staring out the windows into the lush, natural landscape of beautiful Meadow Vista and ask myself, "Well, where would you rather be?" and no other place comes to mind.