I don’t.
I am so glad I have a black thumb.
I’ve been known to kill cacti.
It’s easy to do. For me, at any rate.
That’s why no one ever expects me to grow anything.
That’s why I can just walk into a store and walk out with whatever “garden” I feel like having at the time.
That’s why I don’t have to toil for hours and get dirty to get what I can more easily and quickly get at a grocer or a Farmers Market. That way, I still get the great taste all home gardeners rave about and still none of the work.
If people thought I could actually grow something rather than kill young seedlings with abandon, I’m not sure I would be able to get away from all the nongardening guilt I experience.
I thought about my gardening prowess, or lack thereof to be more exact, recently because everybody around me seems to be getting into the spring spirit and planting things.
Tomatoes.
Beans.
Whole gardens.
Landscaping flower garden beds filled with petunias and geraniums.
I just laugh inside.
I am exempt from such drudgery, although I can already see thousands of soil-stained knees jumping up in protest explaining what a beautiful, nurturing, “green” activity gardening is, helping both the environment and the gardeners themselves with peace of mind and great nutrition.
Yeah, OK. It’s healthy for both the environment and for a body. Good exercise, sorta. Great for your peace of mind, I’m sure.
I just don’t like all the dirt and the hot sun and the squatting on my knees part of it. I want to get my food, and get it quickly, and not have to worry about whether or not it’s even going to be there. Whether there is too much rain or not enough, whether the sun will shine, among others.
But what I really don’t like the most is my inability to grow a potato, or anything that looks like it is supposed to look like on the seed package or the container box or that little plastic stick that has information printed in a size that can only be read with a microscope. Not a magnifying glass, a real, honest to goodness, big old microscope. It’s that small.
Oh, and I almost forgot. I really, really, really, really, ad finitum, don’t like it when the squirrels eat all my seeds out of the ground — but mostly what I hate is when the birdseed in the bird feeders that are put up painstakingly have all their goodies stolen by those who don’t deserve it.
But, as far as the birds are concerned, they don’t eat the birdseed much anyway because they are eating all of my tomatoes and pepper plants. Or, maybe it’s because the squirrels are eating all the birdseed that the birds had to resort to eating my garden.
I’m not sure.
Hard to tell which comes first — the birds in the garden or the squirrels in the bird feeder.
I’m getting a tad confused.
Let’s see, squirrels, birds, oh, yeah, the rabbits!
Oh, those pesky lil’ ole wabbits!
Just ask Elmer Fudd. I’m sure he’d agree with me too.
I really hate those rabbits the most because they eat all my lettuce, cabbage and beans — well, just about everything frankly. They don’t seem to discriminate much.
And it’s not even as if they make a meal out of it. They seem to take a bite, leave the rest and just ruin it for the rest of us. If they want their own tomatoes, I think they should grow them themselves — or at least go to the grocery or Farmers Market and buy their own.
I suppose I should be more generous and be willing to share, but apparently I am not.
I never really did have a garden of my own — one or two plants I’ve killed along the way — but no garden. My mom did though — several years ago for almost 10 years or so.
It was a frustrating event every year, every day, almost every hour during the spring and summer, mainly. All the toil and hard work, and frustrating, very frustrating, wondering if what she planted would take root and grow into beautiful plants producing beautiful fruit and veggies, and then having every freeloader in the neighborhood take advantage — no asking, just up and pluck one of my mom’s hard worked-for tomatoes.
Without even a thank you, ma’am.
And, don’t talk to me about fences and such. A friend of mine says hanging pie plates and CDs out in the garden will scare many critters away. But how goofy would that look? But nothing ever seemed to keep them rascally wabbits out, no matter what my mom tried. I guess I should be grateful mom didn’t have the perennial Colorado problem of deer. They really can destroy a garden.
Mom eventually gave up.
I think she has a couple of lilies left. Not sure, though.
It was quite nice, however, I must admit, while it lasted.
Especially those homegrown tomatoes!
Even my upstairs neighbor is growing tomatoes — inside. Cherry tomatoes. Apparently, they’re doing well.
A friend of mine told me she has a fantastic recipe for cherry tomatoes which I can share with y’all. Well, actually, a recipe is a little more than it really is. It’s more of a snack or an appetizer.
Anyway ...
First, gather up all those cherry tomatoes, like my upstairs neighbor will soon harvest. Carefully, cut a tiny little bit of the top off — the part that was attached to the stem and still has that little “navel” mark on it — and then gingerly take out the little seeds and only the seeds, if possible. Use one of those spoons with the serrated edges, but, again, as tiny as possible.
Next, take some crispy bacon and lettuce and cut them up together really tiny. I’m talking itsy, bitsy, teeny weeny small.
Mix the bacon and lettuce up with some ranch dressing — to taste, as they always say in these recipes.
Then put whatever will fit into the tiny cavity of the cleared cherry tomato. Chill.
“My kids love em,” she said. And they’re healthy — fresh from the garden.쇓
