Rebecca Waterhouse. You always know where to look for Rebecca because you can hear her laughing or singing. At Meadow Lark, this would come in handy as Rebecca was exactly the person you’d hope to find when a crack of lightning or a shattering plate would cause everyone to freeze. Without missing a beat, and as cheerfully as she'd been arranging flowers a split second before, Rebecca would start unloading tents or picking up the shards of Limoges china. She had a way of putting everything into perspective… Better to weather a storm now than during the service. The broken plate? It would bring us luck.
Rebecca grew up on a farm in rural Oregon. Her parents raised sheep, pigs, ducks, geese, chickens and turkeys. From her mother, a cookbook author, she learned to garden, cook, can and preserve. Her father, a fiddler, must be responsible for the music in her head. With such a hands-on upbringing, it’s no surprise that Rebecca took an interest in artistic endeavors. She majored in Studio Art at Mills College, and threw in a degree in French. This took her to France, first to Brittany, where she fell in love with a Norman, and then to Paris, where she lived in a charming apartment in the 12th and shopped at Marché d’Aligré.
When we first met via Skype, Rebecca was seated in front of her large marble fireplace. Over the next few months, she wrapped up her job, married Guillaume—the Norman-from-Brittany—and moved to Boulder. With her Oregon upbringing, Rebecca was no less at home at Meadow Lark as she had been in Paris, and she tackled our work as only someone who grew up pitching in on a homestead would: smiling and singing. She enlivened our lunchtimes with her considerable storytelling skills, figured out how to prepare milkweed pods for consumption, and provided impromptu lessons in French wine label pronunciation: By season's end, everyone could say Bru-Bache Jurançon Sec or even François Chidaine Montlouis sur Loire ‘Les Choisilles’ with a perfect accent.
Since Meadow Lark, Rebecca has played a huge part in re-invigorating Boulder County’s chapter of Slow Food, for which she is now the chair. Lately she's taken her smile and botanical knowledge to Harlequin Gardens. Should you find yourself in need of a certain variety of plum tree, or perhaps wondering whether you ought to plant cerfeuil or ciboulette, just wander among the plants and listen for a song.