Musings and Meanderings
by:

Tammy Cullers

   Gardens and Cozy Mysteries seem to belong together. Maybe it’s because the sleuths in cozies are often old ladies, and old ladies tend to have gardens…Just think of all the times you’ve read a book that featured a corpse amongst the lavender and roses!

            About all I can do in the garden in mid December is look out on the snow-covered dirt and imagine what it will look like in half a year. At least in December we can see colorful arrays of poinsettias, reminding us that some things do grow in cold weather. By mid January, however, my poor flowers are dried and pale from lack of water, and by the time Valentine’s Day rolls around, their dried bodies have been added to the compost pile.

            I think I am a “virtual gardener” more than an “actual gardener.” I love to read gardening books and browse seed catalogues. I imagine a backyard filled with gorgeous flowers and succulent fruit trees. I picture all of the neighbors coming over to pick plump, ripe fruit from my teeming berry bushes.  But getting those images translated into reality is the tricky part. Somehow, my mental pictures look so much lovelier than the tiny, dried seeds that arrive at my doorstep in brown paper packets. In my dreams, the soil is always rich, and rain is abundant. The dry, hot days of August never quite make it into the picture at all.

            Sometimes I think my love of writing follows the same inclinations as my love of gardening. I can hear the applause as I walk the long isle to receive the Agatha Award or another prestigious honor bestowed on deserving mystery writers. I see bookstores continuously having to stock their shelves with my current bestseller. But then, I look at the fledgling manuscript trembling on my word processor. Its tentative plot and shaky characters seem ready to sprint off the page at a moments notice. Sometimes I almost hear them beg me not to send them out into the public. 

            Alas, “my” world rarely parallels the “real” world. Perhaps someday I can bridge the gap between the two. In the meantime, however, I suppose I’ll just plod along. Sometimes my garden actually produces beautiful plants, in spite of my haphazard care. Perhaps my writing will do the same.