I open a sliding glass door from the kitchen into the greenhouse. On my right sitting on a wooden bench are four plants - pot marigold (Calendula officianalis), rice (Oryza sativa), asparagus fern (Asparagus setaceous) and elder (Sambucus nigra). They have been here in my imaginary greenhouse for a number of years now. Straight ahead against the east facing glass are the beginnings of an alpine collection. Heading on through a glass door draped in common ivy (Hedera helix) we reach my imaginary garden.
The garden comprises 'rooms'. The first is an approximation of the Caledonian pinewoods - gnarled silver birch (Betula pendula) dot the edge of a stream among moss, lichens, heathers and dwarf Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris). The ghostly colour gradations, the textures, all tell me I am somewhere home, some atmosphere that shaped me growing up without my knowing it. This part of the garden has taken shape slowly as I've come to learn more about the landscapes I grew up amongst. The more I learn the more I can picture in my mind the more I can connect this knowledge with what I learn in future.
What started as a mnemonic technique of rote memory becomes something more substantial. It is like gardening which as I work on it it works on me. So my experience of the plant kingdom and ecology becomes more nuanced. The boundary between my organism and world becomes more porous. Imagination is the portal/vehicle.
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1. https://aeon.co/ideas/this-ancient-mnemonic-technique-builds-a-palace-of-memory
