People ask about the pool. There isn't one, and I have learned to say it plainly and then wait, because the follow-up is where it gets good.
What's coming instead is a cutting garden. I've seen the plan — it was pinned up in the leasing office like a treasure map, and I stood there longer than I meant to. Rows, real ones, drawn for the sunniest stretch of the property. Zinnias that argue with the Florida heat and win. Cosmos on stems too tall for their own opinions. Snapdragons for winter, which is when Florida finally apologizes. It's the old British idea — flowers grown on purpose to be taken away — translated for our light, our rain, our soil.
The rule I like best is already written: up to five stems per home, per week, from the marked rows. Five is a good number. Five is a jar, not a haul. Five means the neighbor after you rounds the corner and still catches her breath a little. There is a plan for Friday Flowers too — a standing bouquet hour, stems supplied, bring your own vase — and I have opinions about which vase, and the vase has no idea yet.
I'll tell you what a cutting garden really is, since I've had time to think while the beds are still on paper. A garden you only look at keeps you on the path, hands behind your back, like a museum with mosquitoes. A cutting garden hands you the snips and says: take some home. That's the whole philosophy. Permission, five stems at a time.
They'll call the opening The First Cut, and I intend to be there early, the way some people camp out for concert tickets. The ocean handles the swimming, three minutes down the walk. The zinnias, when they come, are mine.
— M.