I knew what I was looking for: open meadow, sun-torched. Lupine and snapdragon lapping at the blue sky. Giant sunflowers. Raised beds. Summer squash with crepe-paper blossoms, gulping up the light. A garden that could feed a family, could feed the heart with its color and scent.

We’d been living on a shady plot on River Street for eight years. We were in our late twenties when we first moved in, both musicians playing full-time in bands that regularly took us across the country on tour. Seasons in upstate New York were extreme, but we never stayed home long enough to see the year’s full swing. We missed the two-week window when the azalea bloomed in spring, the moment in October when the goldenrod lost its yellow and died.

But when the pandemic hit in 2020 and all our shows were cancelled indefinitely, we began to pay attention to the land. The migrating birds, the striped throats of crocuses, the shale-filled soil. I made a sun map, tracking the sun’s position across the course of a day, diligently taking pictures of different angles of the yard to catch the slant of light in order to determine where to put a garden. The sun moved like a wild thing, prowling the perimeter of our quarter-acre plot.

The map showed what I already suspected: There was no corner that got full sun. We were completely surrounded by trees. Still, I picked a spot that looked the most promising, built a couple of small cedar beds. Brought the seedlings home from the nursery, nestled in the backseat of the car like a baby. I wanted so badly to nurture something in that era of death and disease. But a month later, the plants were all spindly, bug-eaten, sad. 

We could cut down the honey locust, my husband suggested. Let in some more light. It was tempting. But as much as I yearned for an abundant garden, I couldn’t do it. Couldn’t sacrifice life to make more life. I loved the trees: the bearded spruce, the grandmother maple, the hemlocks with the citrus needles we once baked into Christmas cookies for our neighbors. Most of all, I loved the honey locust, the way it crawled with nuthatches and sapsuckers, the old rope swing hanging from a lower branch.

Over the years, we had grown up in the shade of those trees. We got married, got pregnant, lost a baby, got pregnant again. We brought our son River home in the soft shadows of early June. There was something about the shade that made us strong, adaptable, able to weather life’s swinging scythe, the pendulum of highs and lows. We were protected in that grove, away from the harsh glare of the world. 

So I couldn’t cut down the trees, but I could dream of where we’d live next, the sun that would follow.

Just before River turned two, we found it: our forever home. A house the color of river water — blue-gray, silty — on eight acres of wild land. There were warblers calling in the woods, a creek fizzling on the house’s northern flank. A family of turkeys skittered through the grass. I was so entranced by the magic of the place that I forgot myself, felt time collapse, felt the hand of my ancestors like a cool wind over my forehead, telling me I was home.

It wasn’t until after our offer was accepted that I realized the miscalculation I’d made. The house was completely surrounded by trees. There would be no full sun, no gorgeous eggplants, no future delphiniums.

I was furious with myself. After all those years of envisioning the garden — life flowing from my fingertips into the land and back again — how had I let this happen?

But then I remembered. It wasn’t just the old River Street house that was shady. It was my childhood home in Western Massachusetts too. I was a little girl in the dappled light, making fairy houses with ferns and moss, the tiny teacup flowers of pink and purple lungwort. I became who I am in a bower of pine. So of course, I felt at home when I saw the new house — this is the landscape I’ve lived in my entire life, the flora my heart knows best.

The vision has changed, but now I know what to do with the new land. I will plant lungwort and bleeding heart. I will lead River and his baby brother Shea through the woods each spring to greet the trout lily and trillium. They will grow up in the shade, as I have. Learning to love the shifting shadows. Learning to thrive even in the moments when the light leaves them. Understanding that home will follow them wherever there are trees — that home is a quality of light, a canopy of protective branches, a dappling.