Weed, California, June 23, 2012 — Outside I have a garden of sorts. Yes, the bloggard has become a gardener, of sorts.
I have never done this before. When I was a child, in self-defense I carefully avoided learning how to iron, to sew a button, or to do anything in a garden. I was afraid that I would become saddled with another “chore.” (I didn’t know how easy was my life then.)
I do not actually know anything about gardening, but my fiancé Susan knows these things, and she has assisted me. Actually it was an accident and I walked into it backwards. You see, last year, the roommate Carolyn — one of the folks who has shared my house, which is larger than I need just for myself — and some other roommates declared that they yearned for a garden. They pined for a garden. Their lives would be a joy forever, if only they had a garden.
I designed a couple of elevated beds, about 5 feet by 12 feet, and built the boxes, wire mesh on the bottom against the gophers, and got Glenn to bring me a truckload of manure and soil from the feedlot on his farm. It seemed a lot of work building these boxes, but then Carolyn planted and watered and grew the vegetables.
I thought she was nuts planting lettuces, because they’re so cheap in the store. Of course, the first time I tasted one, I changed my mind.
But somewhere between last summer and this summer, Carolyn moved on to greener pastures, and the new roomies wanted no truck with the garden. So …
