In our garden

There is a phrase, I have been longing to say lately. "In our garden we are growing..." There is no real reason that we don't have a garden yet. I could blame Ken for being lazy, he could blame me for getting cancer and taking up all of his time. The list of blame is endless, but the reality is the growing season is relatively short! It is said not to "should" on yourself, but I feel that I should be outside weeding and making ready the spot. We did get that far and actually farther than that. We worked and weeded and hoed the future spot into submission (and when I say "we" I mean Ken. I served Iced tea, I was some help. Can't have my man drop dead of dehydration on top of where our tomato's will be). This unfortunately was a several  months back. Actually prior to my being diagnosed with cancer and prior to rain becoming and issue in sunny Southern California.

I can throw out 100's of excuses but the reality is that I am daily shamed by my in-laws. Steve and Ruthie have planted for this year. Tomatoes are growing. They have given us lettuce and I drive in to our yard daily to see "the strip of nothing". When did I get so afraid of a little rain? I should be weeding right now! I tell myself that all day long until it is time to leave for radiation and therefore too late. This past weekend I read "The Bucolic Plague" by Josh Kelmer-Purcel. It is a great motivator for anyone wanting to have a garden. Of course right now it is a source of my shame. I should (there is that word again) be working the land. I want the perfect tomato! I want a salad that doesn't taste like cardboard, but springs to life in your mouth. Even the vegetables purchased from the organic farmers market don't taste as good as the ones I remember from my childhood. My parents always had a garden. I never got too involved in it and as an adult I regret that now. I also really regret killing my Dad's entire garden one year while he was on vacation and I was supposed to be watering it daily. He came home to a mud pit with sun fried vegetables. "What? I watered!" I screamed back at him. Of course he was smart enough to know that I had not watered daily and waited until the last day to soak the hell out of the dead space. I think I saw a tear in his eye as he bit a farewell to his okra.

Now I want to grow my own food and I am too embarrassed to ask my Dad or in Laws for advice. I think that is a big part of the reason that the strip is still the strip and not the garden. We read Sunset magazine and Martha Stewart Living, but what we both really need is someone to roll the magazines up, smack us both in the head and force us outside. If we don't we'll never have the perfect tomato, or home grown kale, or watercress (what ever the hell that is. Ken keeps telling me I need to eat it). If  we don't master that art of the garden we will never get our chickens and we will never experience the liquid gold that I so jealously read about in the Bucolic Plague. My new friend Csaba apparently has an amazing garden at his New Orleans home (and yes I am jealous of both the garden and the New Orleans part). He has sent me all sorts of inspirational messages to get up and get planting. OK, enough already! I want a good tomato! Today Ken will get the surprise of his life. When he gets home he will find the strip, weeded and hoed! I will be victorious! I will be the type of guy that buys dirt! And I will blog about it!