Several years ago my father passed. It’s coming up on 3 years in August. Fifteen months later, my mother passed, and 5 days after that my sister passed. You may wonder what this has to do with gardening. Everything. It has everything to do with the garden. How? I’ll tell ya. My folks loved gardening, especially when we lived in New England. Mom had what she called a rock garden with portulaca and the last time looked up the property online, it appeared to still be there. They had a vegetable garden in the back that produced well. So many fond memories! The garden has become my place of solace and reflection. It’s taught me patience and gratitude.
I’ve been left in charge of the family trust and as such their house maintenance is on the list of my many tasks. Bear with me. I’m getting to the point. A year ago, I had the house yard cleaned up. A massive accumulation of leaves, pine needles, pinecones, and so much more, including having a 50+ foot dead tree taken down and chipped. My ‘guys’ gave me a truckload of all this that is now a beautiful compost pile that I am using in my garden! I love that each bed has a little of my parents’ property to help nurture my plantings much the way they nurtured me. I am forever grateful for their unconditional love, grace, and understanding.
Having said all this, I am entering year number three of the garden and have grown from three raised beds to eight along with a dozen or so repurposed cattle tubs. Last year the garden gifted me with an assortment of beets, carrots, and radishes, along with okra, eggplants, lettuce and spinach. But wait! There’s more! It gifted me with a wonderful variety of tomatoes. Not just at the beginning of season, but a true bumper crop at the end of the season. From this experience, I learned to narrow down my tomato choices, so this year, I have 4 varieties instead of 10. I just harvested my first batch of spinach with more on the way as this year, I have a greens-dedicated bed that is nothing but lettuce, spinach, arugula, and kale.
In the beet bed, I’ve been pulling what I thought was weeds because what was breaking through the dirt didn’t look like baby beet leaves. Then I got to thinking, well, what if it is baby beet greens? I decided to leave the ones that were peeking out alone to see exactly what they were. Turns out, they are neither beets or weeds. They are Violas! …and that’s life in my day!
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