A Small Garden
Very late start in the garden this year. It has been cold and damp and dreary most of the month...at least since we got back from Florida. It rained the first eleven days. It has been down in the 50’s the rest of the time. I am sitting here in my jeans and my old, green, Plaza Construction fleece zipped up tight for warmth as I type this. That has been my uniform pretty much the whole month of May. But yesterday something turned over in our heads. The day dawned bright and it cleared and the sun warmed everything and brought us to a resolution to put the garden in.
That is not to say that nothing had been done to date out there in the garden plot, because a lot had. I had already raked up most of the leaves left over from the Fall. I brought the weed-burner in and blasted the Winter grass and a lot of the weeds. I had even turned some of the soil and planted 8 tomato plants. Elisabeth and I had decided we’d not plant a large garden this year. I thought the 8 tomatoes and some basil would be plenty. Her idea of “small” was different though, and it included using up all the seeds that were left in the cabinet in the dining room. A complete “clean out” of the bottom of that cabinet produced packets of old, outdated seeds that my lovely, frugal wife just had to use up. Whether they will sprout or not is not the point. They shall not go to waste without an attempt to bring them to life. This little exercise in utility necessitated turning three more areas and seeding them and covering with plastic so they would sprout. That was yesterday. Oh!! And then she decided to plant flowers in a couple of other small sections-more cleaning out. And then she decided to, perhaps, put in just a few squash plants. Just a few. She asked “would you prepare that little area over there for me tomorrow?” and what could I say?
So, the small garden has now almost taken on the proportions of a regular garden but who cares. I knew this would happen the minute she was so adamant about keeping it small. That was just an idle discussion we’d had as we munched the miles in the CRV pulling the Scamp behind us through the long state of Virginia (or was it Georgia?) on our way home. I knew once we were in that old, rickety fencing and the green gate of the garden slapped closed behind us that the plan would change. By the end of the Summer the garden would be burgeoning. The last minute squash plants would be fighting for every inch of ground and we would be battling to keep them from climbing on the eight tomato plants and over the lettuce of our “small” garden. Truth be told, I am very happy with this “small” garden.
