Matt Sumell* emailed us his swell car bumper improvisation and the story behind it:

…back in my college days I drove a Hyundai hatchback with a home-made wooden rear bumper. I graduated with an English and Environmental Science Degree, which prepared me for nothing at the time, so I took a job in the local Home Depot garden department. It was there that I got the idea for the window-box addition to my wooden bumper.

…at first I went with my favorites, Gerber Daisies. Then I planted wildflower seeds. I’d drive around, occasionally being ridiculed for my eccentric car. But every now and then, someone would pull up next to me on the highway, beep the horn and mouth “thank you.” It was pretty great.

It’s a take on guerilla gardening we hadn’t though of, with just the right combo of gift and surprise.

*Matt Sumell is a writer whose short stories have been published in Electric Literature, Noon, and elsewhere. Thanks Matt!

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guerilla florist bella meyer: “flowers as natural art supplies”

thinking about structures from the inside out

cars as paint brushes and other guerrilla activities

leaving secret (or surprise) presents