Molly Ringwald

Am I dating myself when I say that Pretty in Pink along with 16 Candles defined my teenage years? I love this dress Molly Ringwald's character made...truly a D.I.Y. moment...

Martha Stewart Living magazine recently published a short essay written by Molly Ringwald about her love of gardening. I think it was written just for me...my teen idol and gardening? A match made in heaven.

In the essay entitled "A Garden Grows Up", she shares her heartache over losing a pregnancy and how she found solace in her New York City rooftop garden. In her words;

Then, nearly six months later,

the unthinkable happened:

I lost the baby. I found almost

nothing to fill the emptiness—

no books, no films, no theater, no

people. It was a very solitary

sadness. To my surprise, the one

thing that did make me feel a

little better was venturing up to

the roof alone and putting my

hands in the soil.

And so I set about rebuilding

the garden myself. I hauled

bags of dirt up the six flights of

stairs, stripped the trellises,

and painted them chartreuse.

When it came time to plant, I

couldn’t settle on a color scheme,

so I chose all of them. I planted

pink fringed tulips that resembled

little girls’ dresses and a

large maple tree with kelly green

leaves and coral bark. Perhaps

inspired by her new surroundings,

the peach tree made a

miraculous recovery, producing

enough fruit for one whole pie!

My garden became a destination

for many of my friends,

but on September 11, I was there

alone, surrounded by my

trees and flowers, watching the

towers come down.

Molly Ringwald's second book, When It Happens to You: A Novel in Stories (Harper Collins) came out on August 23,2012.

 Thanks for being such an inspiration!