We came back from picking up Maria’s wood yesterday to find some daffodils in a green pot by the back door.
“Anne,” I said, and Maria nodded. She hoped it wasn’t too cold for the flowers, she said, rushing them inside.
It had to be Anne. Anne Dambrowski is our bookkeeper and a passionate gardener. She has been scouring the town dump for plastic milk jugs to grow flowers in, she is preparing for her garden. Anne never complains about her life, but it has taken some twists and turns.
When I met Anne, she was part of a group that tended big old gardens like the one at Bedlam Farm. I had no idea how to deal with a big garden like that, and I was deep into hiring people to lead my life. Anne was shy, quiet, she was work in the sun all day and sit under some shade with fellow gardeners and have lunch. She loved to talk with my dogs, she just loved them. She had a glower that could freeze water, and a smile that could melt ice.
The old gardens at the farm, neglected, came to life under the care of Anne – she worked so hard in the hot sun and dirt – and I was grateful to Anne when I started taking photos of those flowers. She was the reason they were there. I was distracted by the divorce, and my suffocating panic at trying to figure out my finances, something I never handled in my first marriage. I couldn’t figure out what I had, what I owed and the paperwork and confusion and bills just piled up and one afternoon I just thought I was done. That night I got an e-mail late at night, and it said simply “I am a bookkeeper. You look like you need help.” I didn’t know who it was from at first and then I figured out it was this quiet, curious flower loving person who was taking care of my garden. I wondered how she knew, I have never asked her. I said yes, and Anne came the next day hauled out my papers, and returned soon to sit in my office to say quietly, “it’s time to panic.”
I did and we took it from there. Things are different now. I have even less money, and owe much more, but I stopped panicking about it. Anne has brought order to my financial life and Maria’s, insofar as such a thing is possible and I was terrified of her for some years, she has become one of those rare and precious friends you trust. She loves animals dearly, and is still waiting to pat Frieda. She loves books as well, and we pass them back at forth. Sometimes, early in the morning, when I am restless and moving about, I’ll get an e-mail alerting me to a comet in the sky, an eclipse. The other morning I got one that alerted me to a shooting start streaking across our sky. Sometimes she asks me what this check was for and what Nik software is. She makes me keep track of my mileage and save all receipts.
I suspect Anne learned that we are plotting a garden, and she offered some daffodils. I put them in the window and it looked like a painting to me. Sometimes when Anne glowers at me – she has the most impressive glower, she would have made a formidable nun or headmistress – it is unnerving, but she has the biggest heart. She melts at the sight of a barn cat and loves all flowers. She is unusual. She is a fencer and loves to go fencing tournaments and lose to people decades younger than she is. She doesn’t really care about winning, she just loves to fence, and take long train rides with her beloved Bob.
I love a life where your bookkeeper leaves daffodils by the back door. I knew it was Anne. Who else could it have been?