BY KRISTA RAMSEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Say "festival" in Cincinnati, and most people think of Riverfest or Oktoberfest. But one of the city's best little parties is going on today.

It's the Civic Garden Center's Plant, Herb and Hosta Sale, and it will improve your complexion, raise your spirits and make you feel you dwell among the friendliest people on the planet.

It's not new, nor even necessarily improved (although the plant selection gets better every year and people say the May wine does, too). But you should take yourself there - as soon as possible - because it is a Cincinnati institution not to be missed. If you have already been, then go again with enlightened eyes.

Here is the best thing about it: It's not one of those big, overly promoted events where you pay all this money and feel you should have fun. It's just one of those events where you do have fun.

It's safe. A place to let your guard down. You will be happy here, ensconced in one of the city's loveliest gardens, the Hauck Botanic Garden, and surrounded by the most vibrant plants around.

And you can pretend it's your garden. Pretend the world is good again, people are civil and nature is cherished. Pretend you live in the middle of a small, friendly town, and all is well with the world. Because, at the plant sale, all is.

And remember to watch the crowds.

''There's a whole group that think it's a garden party, and wear hats and bring a basket over their arm, drifting through like it's an English countryside," says Jeanne Robson, membership coordinator.

Others come in their knee-high Wellies and gardeners' pants, with a happy, hurried gait that suggests they just tore themselves out of the muck to snap up one rare buy.

They port charming containers as well - worn baskets, boxes, red wagons, garden carts. It's obvious that this isn't just a plant sale. This is market day, one of the best-loved American traditions of all.

And forget the nacho-pizza-corndog fare at most festivals.

"Gardeners are a hungry bunch," Mrs. Robson acknowledges, so there are plenty of baked goods, egg salad sandwiches, good coffee, secret recipe herb bread and, of course, the legendary May wine. "Some people arrive at 10 a.m.," Mrs. Robson says with a smile, "and want to know where the May wine is."

Others, the sober and true plants-women and men, take their positions an hour and a half before the gates open at 9 a.m. to find a rare botanical gem or two.

A stop at the donated-perennials booth might turn up a Peruvian daffodil, with blooms the size of a softball. Red violas have been spotted at the shade plant booth. There's a rumor that tiny lemon-lime hostas may be found, and if you're really lucky (and really early) you might even latch onto a chicken gizzard vine. You could be the owner of one of the few plants in nature with a neon pink stem.

But you'll be just as welcome if you can't tell a calendula from a coreopsis. Slide from booth to booth and listen carefully. You'll pick up tips on what grows in clay, what blooms true blue, what's the hottest thing for a cool shade bed.

"There are usually a few county extension agents in disguise and we have horticulturists, but no one wants to put a shingle on that says, 'I'm an expert,' " says Martha Howard, this year's chairman. "They recognize that the person working next to them without an official title knows just as much as they do."

And everyone is unmistakably happy to share what they know. Although the sale is a mainstay fund-raiser and pays for gardening projects across the city, it is really about fostering a love for plants.

''Remember, our purpose here is educating people about gardening," Mrs. Howard says of the garden center. "Only one day a year do we sell plants."

But what a day.

The groceries, the errands, the laundry can wait. But the Johnny-Jump-Ups, Spanish lavender and sea thrift can't. Take a market stroll through the historic plant sale and remember what's good about gardening, about Cincinnati and life.

Krista Ramsey's column appears in The Enquirer on Saturdays. Write her at 312 Elm St., Cincinnati 45202 or fax at 768-8340.

RAMSEY ARCHIVE