When I was growing up, my siblings and I spent a lot of time outside. We had a swing set that we swung so hard on, the whole structure would rock. There were mums, irises, and day lilies along the back of the house, and steps leading from our back door that were, in my memory, big and wide and perfect for sitting on. As an older kid, I claimed a corner of the yard and planted flowers in front of a beautiful stand of ferns.

I loved the smell of the clean laundry on our clothesline. I was fascinated by the iridescent wings of the Japanese beetles that clung to the clothes and the crisp, starchy feeling of the laundry as it came off the line. For the many sunny days when the clothes dried uninterrupted, there was also the rush of adrenaline from pulling down clothes as the first drops of a rainstorm began to fall.

Beyond our backyard, behind our garage, extended The Field. It sloped down into a flat expanse, surrounded by trees and brush. It featured prominently in my dreams as a child. Prehistoric animals ambled across it, I flew through the sky above, and sometimes it was submerged in water (this last thing also happened in real life several times during spring flooding).Beyond another slope, the field gave way to trees and undergrowth, and a small trail led to the Susquehanna River. It changed with the seasons, running high and fast in the spring, cool and lazy in the summer, and edges frozen in wintertime, the nearby slopes transformed into sledding hills.

Toads hid in the low growing plants. The earthy musk of the river water, skunk cabbage, and the other growth would fill the air. Fireflies flickered in the field at night. Wildflowers like phlox and goldenrod grew in season. My siblings and I played Wild People with the neighbor kids, subsisting on weeds and berries and making houses in the huge bushes that edged The Field, laying cut grass for a rug. We got stung by bees and scraped by briars and it was wonderful.

My Grandmom’s house was another type of wonderland. Pussywillow, dogwood, and every color of azalea rose up from every corner. There was a field, a forest, and a koi pond. There was a giant red maple with thick branches at the perfect height for climbing. A full rain barrel. A thousand flowers to sample, and a thousand places to hide and explore.It was this second wonderland that I dreamed of creating for my kids in our backyard. When we moved here it was a weedy expanse. A decent amount of grass grew in the front half of our backyard, while the back half boasted the patchy beard of a youth. I was hopeful that each year I could add some of the plants I had loved from my childhood home and my Grandmother’s garden, and that over the years, it would be a dewy oasis like the one I remembered.

I started with pussywillow, ferns, tulips, and azalea. All of them died except for the tulips, of which only three or four of the 50 or so I planted survived the squirrels.

Then my oldest son taught himself how to ride a bike. As the years went on, wheelies, burn outs, motorized bikes, and jumps wore our scrappy grass down to packed dirt in most places. He became the neighborhood mechanic, and our yard accumulated bike seats, frames, wheels, inner tubes, and brake lines. Our outdoor space went from a semi-hopeful jumble of weeds and some rugged plants to an expanse of dirt covered with bike parts, some brave flowers  and a little beleaguered grass growing around the edges.I still plant something new every year or two. I added rain chains and rain barrels. I’ve had some success with forsythia. I weed the garden when I can, and I mow what’s left of the grass. I love nothing better than the days when I have time to hang clothes to dry on the clothesline.

This past fall, I came back from Amsterdam with tulips of every color and planted them with frozen fingers on a December day. Today, they’re poking their brave heads above the soil.

I’ve given up on having a beautiful fairyland for my kids to play in. They don’t seem to mind the packed dirt. Maybe someday they’ll hope to have a yard like ours where it looks so bad that they don’t have to worry about their kids digging huge holes or riding bikes and tearing up the grass. Maybe all they’ll remember are the flowers around the edges and the clothes on the line.