In My Own Little Corner

           

When I was a young girl, my dad religiously made a garden for every season.  Rows upon endless rows of green beans, tomatoes (one year my brothers slipped in a few seeds of a different mother...that was interesting), and other green, red, blue, sticky, gross plants.  We'd have to help.  No big deal except that I totally hated anything that had to do with manual labor.  

Very serious manual labor.

Serious.

After moving to a larger house and a smaller yard, my dad still made his gardens, however, they were a bit smaller and didn't have a new one for every season.  We still helped, but he started taking short cuts such as watering with a hose instead of a bucket (seriously, you never use a hose, it knocks off flowers...we learned this...repeatedly) and planting shorter rows.  We always had green beans in the spring, though...tomatoes, bell pepper, and cucumbers in the summer, okra whenever, and as hard as he tried, unsuccessful rows of cabbages, broccoli, and that other gross stuff that will not be named.

Eventually, his garden became smaller and smaller...his fruit trees down to two, and as he aged and slowly began to give in to the relentless atrocities of a cajun man's payment to the devil (heart disease, diabetes, blood pressure), the gardens dwindled to the occasional tomato plant or cucumber plant growing along the fence.

I'm pretty sure he missed it.  

He did.

This makes me sad.

Today I woke up early and decided to go outside.  I recently dug a fire pit (go me!) and since it was a cold morning (for Louisiana), I made a small fire, sat down in my kinda sort of shed/carport/storage area, and hung out with my fire.  As the flames dwindled down, I began to roam my garden.  That's right folks, I have a garden.  The blackberry bushes were in back of the shed, and I was able to pick about 11 ripened berries today. Walking on.  The swimming pool flower garden has green plant things shooting out of the ground, and while the pole beans have an unhealthy glimmer to them near the bottom, I am seeing small white flowers beginning to bloom.  An old fish aquarium finally, and I mean FINALLY, is sporting small, two-leaf carrot plants.  I love carrots.  I really do. The potatoes are fighting desperately on, but the strawberries are threatening to overtake the world.  Pretty amazing, if I do say so myself.  I finished the rest of my walk by whacking down thistles with a branch before going back to my fire and eating my blackberry stash...inch worms and all.  

My dad would have loved this place with it's thistles ready to eat at a moments notice, daily ripe blackberries screaming to be picked, strawberries ripening to a tangy sweetness, and so many other possibilities just growing.  It would have been small enough for him to care for.  It would have been enough for him to harvest.  Cook.  Eat.  Store.  I really think he would have liked it here.

I miss not being able to grow with him.  

But the beans don't burn in the kitchen, right?