18 May 2016

Things We Take For Granted:

Requiem for Some Tulips

This spring's tulips at the Senate Fountain. Photo by María Helena Carey

This spring’s tulips at the Senate Fountain. Photo by María Helena Carey

We all appreciate the beauty of the Architect of the Capitol’s landscaping. It’s a locals’ pleasure to walk around the grounds with their perfectly manicured lawns and carefully pruned trees that mostly conform to Frederick Law Olmsted’s original plan –except for the odd flowering tree here and there. But one of the most stunning displays every single year comes in the form of tulip bulbs: Every spring, the Capitol grounds are bursting with little walls of tulips and other bulbs in every color of the rainbow. This year the Capitol fountain was flanked by a sunset orange selection; the beds close to the Senate fountain were reds and pinks. Every possible planter and bed in the grounds boasted these beauties, which bloom in the early part of spring and then are dug up around this time of year to make way for the summer-hardy plants: Cannas, petunias, impatiens cheer up the beds in patriotic colors for Flag Day and the Fourth of July.

You know there is a “But…” headed your way.

Here goes: Capitol Hill resident Lyndsey Medsker happened to pass by the Capitol grounds last year around the time the landscapers were digging up the bulbs and placing the rhizomes in. Seeing the large numbers of tulips being dug up, Medsker asked where they would be taken after digging up. The answer? They are simply thrown away. They are not given to eager local gardeners who would love to have a sunset-colored patch of tulips come up in their garden. They are not donated to other gardens around town. And, well, let’s not even talk about putting them in bags and selling them for a garden-related benefit. Getting ahead of myself here, but can you envision bags of “Authentic U.S. Capitol Tulips” being sold at gift shops and shared far and wide? It would be almost as thrilling as knowing that the carrots you eat are the same carrots Michelle Obama eats, you know?

Fire-red tulip near the Hart Building. Photo by María Helena Carey

Fire-red tulip near the Hart Building. Photo by María Helena Carey

Medsker tried unsuccessfully to reach out to the Architect of the Capitol and Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton’s office, both via email and through social media over the past few months. She also reached out to Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen, whose office  reached out to Norton’s office yesterday. According to Meagan Hatcher-Mays, a legislative assistant with Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton’s office, the Architect of the Capitol is not allowed to donate bulbs or plants. Any plants or bulbs that are pulled out of the grounds are immediately composted and, “It would require legislation to allow plant donation.”

Maybe plants and landscaping are not a big deal to you if you are not a gardener. But, chances are, you still enjoy looking at the nameless sea of colors surrounding you on your run or during your commute. But the bigger issue here is that sharing something beautiful is a great way to make neighbors happy and let them know you appreciate them. Our eponymous neighbor could look into a law change and share the bounty of its gardens, but since we are in the District, it seems that the only way to get the attention to do something as minor as getting some tulips donated –or getting a sledding ban reversed, or getting crucial crime information, or even making people aware that it’s fundamentally wrong that we don’t have the same representation as the rest of the country– is to nag and protest until something happens.

Composting is not a terrible tragedy, and it is true as well that not all hybrid bulbs that are replanted come up again the following year. But when Medsker made off with a few tulips from the Capitol grounds last year, they all turned up in her garden: a powerful metaphor for how showing care, respect, and love for things makes a difference.

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2 responses to “Requiem for Some Tulips”

  1. Elise Bernard says:

    This is INSANE.

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