+JMJ
Dear Parishioners,
Two weeks ago, I had a meeting with Rob Reinhart, our maintenance manager, and with Deb Miller, who has graciously led the effort to keep our parish gardens beautiful for decades now. I consider this meeting a bit of a culmination of other conversations as well – conversations I have had with gardeners and parishioners for the last couple of years. The topic of it all was parish gardens, shrubs and trees.
We are going to be removing the two large maple trees just outside the east entrance of the gathering space. These trees have gotten quite large, blocking the beauty of the entrance altogether. Furthermore, each of them is planted right next to a drain, and there is big concern about what the roots are doing with the drainage system. Finally, these trees drop a ton of seedlings onto the gardens below them; and it makes a mess of those gardens – traditionally and precisely – just after those gardens are mulched and made beautiful. We are considering as replacements some much smaller trees that will not grow so big and that will be easier to maintain.
There are also a few trees along North Wood Street and in the yard next to Fremont Street that will be removed. These trees are basically a messy nuisance. They make a mess of the gardens and sidewalks below them, when they drop their berries and petals throughout the year, although perhaps they are beautiful for a very short time each year. The mushed berries and petals get tracked into our building for months. My understanding is that these trees were not planted as part of the overall planning of the new church. They were an afterthought, coming some years later.
Next there are some bushes that will be removed, mostly bushes that now line the south and east edges of the building. Many of these bushes have run the course of their lifetime, evidenced by significant dead sections. It is also difficult to mulch underneath and behind these bushes; and they are constant receptacles for any trash the wind blows in. Our crew of volunteer gardeners has also diminished significantly over the years, so that we don't have people to take care of the weeding around or trimming of these bushes. In order to keep an aesthetic border around the building, we will lay a bed of decorative stone about two feet wide where the bushes used to be. This will be much easier to maintain.
Finally, we talked about the possibility of eliminating the flower beds in the main parking lot on the east side of the church, across North Wood Street. We don't plan immediately to eliminate these; but we are considering doing so once we lose volunteers to care for them, and perhaps in coordination with the repair of that parking lot within the next couple of years.
As we approach the spring months, I am sure Deb Miller would be happy to hear from anybody who is looking for some volunteer gardening work. Gardeners take responsibility for one garden. Sometimes a couple gardners have teamed up for one garden. In fact, nobody was ever assigned to the new garden we created with the memorial bench of Cathy Krupp and the elementary school sign. Perhaps there are some former school personnel who would like to take care of that garden? You could leave your name with the office, if you are interested. Our gardens are beautiful, and they really do lift the spirits of parishioners as they come to worship the Lord in Holy Mass!
Have a blessed week!
In cordibus Iesu, Mariae et Iosephus,
Father Poggemeyer