"Wha?" you say... I haven't harvested a single eggplant yet, how could it be downhill from here. It boils down to space and ambition. As a lot of us kitchenette gardeners know, you cannot buy one pumpkin vine. You cannot buy two pumpkin seeds. And who in their right mind only wants ONE tomato plant...we've got to have golden, Roma, heirloom, and at least one other type right? And then there are the herbs, the root veggies, the marigolds, the ubiquitous crookneck squash (with the elephantine ear leaves), and viola....my zinnia seedlings have evaporated and the watermelon vine has become a patch....*sigh*
All those gourds and vines usually only give me an armful or two of produce all in the same few weeks of the year. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy it. But my enjoyment usually enters a valley in July and August after peaking with the Solstice.
Yesterday, my dad told me a story that I had heard before. It was about his grandfather who had moved from the country into Thomasville, NC sometime before WWII. He usually leased a few acres on the edge of town just for a vegetable garden but one year he decided to plant it ALL with watermelons. He drove my dad, who was just a little guy then, out to the watermelon patch to show him this eighth wonder of the world. And he made my dad promise not to tell his grandmother about it. She would have gotten angry at such a foolhardy decision....I don't know if she ever did find out because that wasn't part of the story......I cannot imagine she couldn't have considering they didn't exactly rely on Target or Harris Teeter to proffer up sweet white corn in July.
I guess I could think of worse things. Like not growing anything at all.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment