Jenny's Ever-Changing Garden

Anybody who knows me knows that I am out-spoken about my stunning mystery companion and long-time partner, Jennifer Brunswig and her amazing daughter, Pascale Brunswig-Sanborn. It has been a privilege to be a part of their lives for over ten years. I don't have the words to say how grateful I am to be surrounded by so much beauty every day.

I can't express to you how meaningful our humble garden is to us without explaining a few things about Jenny, and my relationship with her. The garden is a celebration of life. She took the wheel on this one, so in this article I celebrate her life as well.

When I met Jenny at the Pub in 2014 she was a patron. At that time publicly, I tried to put my best foot forward, but privately I was in a tail-spin. I wasn't fooling anyone. I was a heavy-drinker and slowly coming to the realization that my professional life was a mess. I have always had dreams and aspirations but I am not and have never been, a practical person. My decisions were catching up to me in a bad way.

I had been on the dating carousel for a while and it left me disappointed and numb.

I was not dating. I had taken myself off-the-market by this point and I resigned myself to spending every single dollar I had at the Pub. Drinking.

I was drinking at the world.

I wasn't interested in friendship let alone dating at this time. I paced the well-worn floorboards of the Pub, going from room-to-room. Being morose. I would usually stay until close, and sometimes crash out in my vehicle parked a block away. I was full of fear, doubt and self-pity. I adopted a cynical, pessimistic view of the world and estranged myself from my family, friends and acquaintances during that time.

Then I saw Jenny sitting down with a glass of wine (she says port) and a few friends who appeared out-of-focus. She turned around and our eyes met and time stopped for a moment.

I didn't allow myself to believe what had just happened. I walked right past her. I thought she was a crazy person. "Maybe an apparition of my beer-soaked brain," I shook my head and muttered to myself.

Jenny was blissfully ignorant of my mental state and didn't seem to care that I was three-sheets-to-the-wind. She just smiled brightly and pierced me with those eyes. Her voice was like a bell, and I couldn't resist it.

I was committed to my sadness. Was she mocking me?

From then on, if she sat down next to me with her Cheshire smile and intent eyes, I would take my beer and vacate to another room, or leave the Pub entirely.

We danced this little dance for several months. Until one evening, when we were both in line for the restroom. Alone. A switch flipped in my mind. I don't know why, I suppose we had been building something up the whole time? I was suddenly drawn to her. It was like I was being swept by an undercurrent, I couldn't help myself.

I pressed her against the wall and kissed her. Then I said, "Do you want to get out of here?"

She confided to me much later that she had seen me during that time speaking with a particular patron intently for an hour. This patron was verifiably mentally-ill, and I had nothing to gain from talking to her. It was not going to boost my social-status or enrich me in any manner but I spoke to her anyway, as a friend. Not humoring her, or chiding her, I entertained every delusional, outlandish idea she put forth and gave gentle feedback. I spoke to that woman as an equal because at that time I felt I was as much an outsider as she was. Jenny witnessed the whole thing and she was quite charmed.

There is something you should know about Jenny...

Kindred Spirits

When she lived in Albany in 2014, she had a French-Angora rabbit named Etienne. She had to trim his fur at least once-a-month because it grew in so fast. Quinn the cat was a semi-feral pest who would scratch and howl at our door or window until we put a food bowl out for him. A frequent pest, guest. Whenever Jenny was trying to work on a chair in the backyard he would plop himself down on top of her work without warning. He would sometimes kill small birds and leave them on our doorstep. In the past she has had horses, dogs, cats, chinchillas, hamsters, frogs, salamanders and birds. When she was a teen she worked at a bird shop, Your Basic Bird on College Avenue in Berkeley. Years later her daughter, Pascale also worked there as a teen. Animals are an expression of nature's perfection. Jenny is dazzled by their innate beauty, individuality and gentle spirits. She feels a strong kinship with animals of all kinds.

Herky

Early on in our relationship, a friend of ours moved away and we took over her dog-walking business. We picked up five to seven dogs from all over the city, walked them for an hour at a park and dropped them all back off, every day. One-by-one. One dog was deep in Oakland, the other was in Berkeley, yet another would be in El Cerrito. It was barely manageable with our other commitments. After several months of doing that we decided that the dogs we enjoyed walking the most resided in Point Richmond. A beautiful out-of-the-way suburb of Richmond. We had two or three dogs we used to walk there. Eventually we were down to one dog, Herky. We walked Herky religiously, for five years. That's Herky an old, cantankerous cattle-dog. He used to pull so hard we'd have to wrap the leash around our waists to keep our shoulders in their sockets.

Stetson And Rita

Did I mention she loves animals? She loves horses most of all. Jenny owned two horses in the past. Stetson and Rita. Stetson was a sixteen year-old thoroughbred, and Rita was a five year-old gaited paso-peruvian. By the time Jenny showed up to the Pub in 2014, her horses had both died. It was a terrible, heart-breaking experience for her. Afterward, with the changing economy, she slowly realized she would never be financially solvent as long as she pursued her childhood dream of owning a horse. She never aspired to horse-ownership again. Unlike me, she is a practical person at the end of the day.

She has been involved with many equestrian communities in the East Bay. Over the years she has taken on various equestrian commitments, but nothing was ever quite the right fit. Recently she has been exploring Point Reyes. Out there she found a rental-string and ranch called Five Brooks Ranch based in Olema. It has been her first positive experience in some years. The grounds are beautiful, staff is professional, the rates are pretty cheap, most importantly the horses are well fed and cared for. She highly recommends you check out Five Brooks Ranch if you're ever out that way. Tell them Jenny sent you.

This was my sad first attempt at an indoor garden several years ago. I wanted plants that would clean the air most efficiently because we spent so much time indoors.

Our backyard was completely paved over when we moved in. There were only a couple patches of dirt where weeds and clover grew. The front half of the backyard closest the house was paved with concrete. The rear half of the backyard was paved with bricks.

A few years ago she said, "Couldn't we just get rid of the bricks?" I told her the landlady might have a problem with it. She asked, "What if there was a beautiful garden there instead? She wouldn't miss the bricks." She was right, our landlady is cool with us. I agreed with her and sighed because I knew it was going to be a lot work. We spent a day digging up bricks and stacking them. Our friends Coyote and Mariah came and loaded them in their truck for a job they were doing, and hauled them away.

Jenny was thrilled, we had a blank canvas of earth to work with. She set to turning the soil right away, she dug her hands in. She smelled the freshly turned soil and let it sift through her fingers.

Off to Annie's Annuals we did go. She started out with the idea of a showy English-cottage-style garden, with many annual flowers. She liked the height and showiness of some of the cottage plants, like sunflowers and foxglove. Some flowers she chose by looks, she chose other flowers by the smell of their leaves. I asked her as we were leaving Annie's how much she spent and she told me not to worry about it. If she couldn't have her first love, animals, she sure wasn't going to worry much about the price of some flowers.

The English cottage garden was a great success, it was beautiful.

But at the end of the year, everything died. There was not one single plant that survived. That's just how it goes with an annual flower garden. Last year, she decided she wanted a more hardy garden that might not be as showy but could last from year-to-year.

Funny story. During the pandemic I went to Home Depot to buy some large metal buckets for the front yard garden, I didn't want anything too nice because it might walk away. As I was congratulating myself for my thoughtfulness, ingenuity, and bargain-hunting skill I let the cart go too soon in the parking lot and it took an unexpected turn into a parked car. It was just my luck, there was a guy sitting in it with the bucket seat reclined. He jumped out and said a few choice words before I calmed him down and took him to the bank so I could withdraw a couple-hundred dollars, the amount we settled on. Anyway, I think they must be the most expensive tin buckets in the world now.

But we are putting them to use. There are a variety of plants growing in those tin buckets. There have been several iterations. One season we wanted herbs, flowers the next. Some have succulents. There is even a little wind-mill made out of a soda can in one of the pots. We got that from the old-man on Solano Ave who makes them. I think he is homeless. I think the front yard garden is funky, in a good way.

Last year she added some California native plants. Coastal sage, lavender, and the state flower volunteered, orange poppies. We didn't plant them, they just appeared. This year the garden looks like a tall blooming meadow because we spread a large container of California native wildflower seeds. It is now a combination of a traditional English cottage garden and native plants. It's been a cold, gray spring so everything has grown unusually tall this season to meet the sun.

Jenny loves spending time with her plants. She pulls weeds, re-pots, transplants, buries seedlings, prunes, and she squats the whole time. She has a funny little squat where her feet are far apart and her knees are knocking together while slapping the dirt with a trowel. She's like a kid playing in the dirt. I love to watch her garden. I can't articulate concisely how it makes me feel. Overjoyed? Tickled? Maybe a bit of both.

The gardens are a little respite from the concrete realities of living in a large city within an even larger metropolitan area. A sanctuary where we are able to slow down and collect our thoughts before proceeding with the days many errands and duties.

I spent a lot of time in the backyard a few years ago during my period of non-contact with my parents. I had a lot to process, and it was the perfect place for quiet contemplation. I think removing the bricks and planting a garden sped up that process. I was no longer staring blankly at bricks and the backside of a fence. There was a beautiful garden to behold.

The sound of an occasional wind-chime and the scintillating colors of the flowers in the gentle breeze. Natural perfection. I started to notice the bees, moths, butterflies, and squirrels. Humming-birds buzzed through frequently, and sometimes bluejays and sparrows. At night we got occasional visits from an opossum or raccoon. Sometimes we heard creatures walking or hopping on the roof. There was more activity. It became difficult to stay morose and ponderous. It was as if our little patch of nature was trying gently to shake me out of my mental quagmire.

We occasionally have music jams. After six o'clock, the party moves from our living room to the backyard. Jenny (or I in her absence) always receives compliments on her garden and she is rightfully proud of her work.

The music jam takes place on the last Sunday of the month. She works the daytime shift at the Pub and gets off when the jam is transitioning from music to party mode. Sometimes we are still jamming when she gets here and she joins us briefly to sing and play guitar. She has a voice like bell and she plays guitar better than I can. She has great manual dexterity and fine motor skills. She has been a part of two cover bands over the years, Sagebrush Sally, and The Panamanics.

Our days with our old cover bands are behind us now, but I have been recording her off-and-on for five years. Mostly on, recently. Ever since the beginning of the pando.

This is a beautiful song and a beautiful rendition by Jenny. She played guitar, then sang over it, then overdubbed her voice in harmony. I was experimenting with different microphones, and cross-fade between them at certain points in the song.

I'm particularly proud of one of our latest cover songs, a digital cover of Bruce Springsteen's Streets Of Philadelphia.

This is my personal favorite. It's one of my favorite songs ever. I put about forty hours of work into the backing track, and Jenny sings. I actually enjoy Jenny's version more than the original.

The Pub.

She is a bartender at the Pub. That's Schmidt's Tobacco & Trading in Albany, California. If you don't know about it, I wrote a post celebrating the regulars recently. She got the job in 2018, she's been working there seven years. She started working there soon after our dog-walking business slowed down. Every week for years she has worked the dreaded clopen, a portmanteau of close and open. She closes the Pub on Saturday night at midnight (usually closing takes until 1:00 AM) and opens it Sunday morning.

In her work she is meticulously thorough and keeps it very clean. She is gentle with the customers, but firm. She has a witty rapport with many customers, some of whom loyally show up on her shift. Raconteurs who hang on to the bar, or their beers near the bench at the bar and keep a dialogue going with her during most of her shift. She takes it all in stride.

The most unlikely people open up to her. She is loved by many, and is the favorite of a few. She has good taste in music, but keeps it low because she knows at this bar, conversation is king. Nobody but under-age trespassers are sad to see her behind the bar.

Jardin Wicker

She is a partner at her home business and second job, Jardin Wicker, at which she specializes in repairing hand-cane, hickory splint, and danish-cord chairs. She and her best friend who she's known since high-school, Michelle Moore started Jardin Wicker in 2010. They learned and perfected their craft for many years at The Canning Shop on Gilman, next door to 924 Gilman, a punk club. A rare craft, and almost lost art. Akin to setting hot metal type for a printing press. Her services are in high-demand because there are so few who know how to weave chairs at professional level.

Housekeeping And Decorating

She is a hard worker and is fastidious in everything she does, especially house-keeping. She keeps her house clean and has her own decorating style. She calls it cottage-style, but it's really her own thing. She has a keen eye for furniture and art. The house is small, but it's warm, colorful, bright and smells of coffee, bacon and mineral incense from New Mexico in the morning.

Cooking And Palate

Jenny is an accomplished cook. She loves food. Eating food. She says cooking is not a passion of hers, but she is good at it none-the-less. One of her favorite cookbooks is Eric Wareheim's Foodheim. Her favorite dishes are BBQ chicken, dirty pasta, and pasole. Sometimes she needs a simplicity-reset and makes a caprese salad, or black beans on a tortilla with avocado and habañero sauce. When we order out, our favorite place without a doubt is Lao Thai Kitchen on Solano Avenue, one block from the Pub. Bua is the proprietor there and we are her favorite customers, tell Bua Jenny and Logan sent you.

An Avid Hiker

She likes to hike, especially with friends. She credits her German heritage for that. I am not an avid hiker, I am a sweaty plodder and I get winded, but she still manages to drag me out of the house from time-to-time.

A Good Mountain Biker

We used to mountain bike together at China Camp and other places. She is a competent mountain biker. I was always impressed when I'd complete a technical section of trail and look back, there she was! She was rarely thrown off her game by obstacles in the trail.

A Happy Camper

Jenny loves to go camping. Even if it's just to Samuel P. Taylor Park. We try to go at least a few times every year, but there have been years where we didn't go camping at all due to illness, or inability to get the time off work.

Jenny's eye for color is quite something, she can detect the most subtle shade differences. She loves to paint with watercolor and gouache. She is a great illustrator, and pattern-maker (she used to quilt). She can draw what her eyes see. She has exquisite hand-eye coordination and a steady hand.

I never forget or take for granted how fortunate I am. My life with Jenny and Pascale has been absolutely magical so far and I hope it continues far into the future. They pulled me out of a bad place and made me a better man. The gratitude and humility I feel (almost) every day washes over me in waves, and brings a tear to my eye.