Preparing the Garden
A few weeks ago I stepped out into the early spring with my tools and began the annual ritual of turning over the dirt in my vegetable garden. It is not particularly quick or glamorous work, but it is necessary. The flipping of the dirt takes the layers of winter and folds them under and into the soil. Everything that fell onto the dirt during winter’s snowfalls is helpful...crumbly dried leaves, feathers, pebbles, broken weeds, and the unknown microscopic fluff of nature all become part of the slurry nourishing and giving life to this year’s plants. Once the entire garden had been turned upside down, I broke up the large clumps, added in fresh dirt and fertilizer, and then raked it into a fine sifted soil. It was ready for the tiny tenderlings to take their place for the next few months.
Every year I promise myself that I will not be dramatic with the garden. I will ignore new varieties, reduce the number of plants, and create a roomy and predictable garden bed. Inevitably, as I peruse the garden center, looking over all the delicious varieties of heirloom tomatoes and hot peppers, I am entranced by the idea that I can grow anything. So I buy everything. When I return home, as my husband opens the trunk with the plants bursting out, he rolls his eyes, chuckles, and carries them around to the back of the house. I know he thinks, “Do you really need to grow a fig tree?” He doesn’t ask because he knows the answer.
I learned to garden from my grandfather, step-father and my father. Each of them taught me different skills about planting, tending, and harvesting vegetables. My dad has the worst soil, and the garden is always full of weeds, but somehow he grows the most tender scallions. My grandfather had a patch of land that, in the off-season, was a dumping ground (compost pile) for all sorts of food scraps. His tomatoes were the best! Probably because of the spaghetti and meatball leftovers. My stepdad has a fenced-in, perfectly rowed, garden with way too many plants because he wants to feed the neighborhood. Every year he curses the rabbits that charge through the fence to eat his fresh green beans. And every year, he plants those beans again. With the same result. He always acts surprised.
Now I garden with my daughter and my husband. He is an engineer, so each spring he designs a new and more secure contraption to stake the tomatoes. We’ve had metal poles, metal cages, and a maze of wooden planks all screwed together. I know come the end of the harvest season, we will spend a day undoing the scaffolding, but in the months until then our precious plants will survive any thunderstorm. He helps weed and harvest, but this is his signature contribution to our garden. From time to time, I look out the window and see his creation, and I smile. It is a symbol for one of the best aspects of his character, his ability to build a safe structure for something that needs to grow.
This month as we celebrate Father’s Day, I reflect on all that my fathers have taught me and how grateful I am for all that my husband is to our family. Each of these dads, in their own way, has planted things, tended to them, and built up a scaffolding. They know that all those little bits of life experience get folded into ourselves, providing nourishment and making us more resilient. And they certainly know that next year is always coming, giving us a chance to start anew.