When I retired friends asked what I would do with all my free time.
“Oh, just more of the good things.” I said, “Reading, theatre, tennis, travel.”
“Try something new, try gardening,” some suggested, “it’s great physical exercise and surprisingly spiritual. Try planting veggies.”
“Gardening’s not for me”. I insisted, “ I don’t have a green thumb.”
But my son does, in fact he’s worked on an organic farm. “Take a garden plot and I’ll plant.”, he promised.
And so he planted – peppers, tomatoes, beans, cucumbers, lettuce and shiny purple eggplant. And we weeded and watered and watched our garden grow.
You know, I think next summer I’ll try strawberries.
Dana Susan Lehrman
Loved having a good chat and delicious lunch. Hope this comment makes it to your blog.
Me too and it made it to the blog, sorry for the late repy!
You did it! Nice eggplants, but your hired help doesn't look like she is working hard enough.
Yep, and I thought redheads from Ohio were hard workers!
Lakeridge plot?
Yes Sara, and you may remember that you encouraged me to do it!
And that’s my visiting friend Paula doing the watering.
One of the things I miss most about living in an apartment is my mom’s and my grandmother’s gardens. Had everything we needed – tomatoes, eggplant, corn, peach tree, fig tree, green veggies. My grandparents never used insecticides. They planted marigolds between rows of plans to keep bugs away! They also had grape vines – what a mystery to visit the dark basements where grapes were kept before they were “pressed” into wine. No, they didn’t use their feet. I have a picture of me sitting atop a grape press when I was about three years old. Those days are gone forever! PS: Gram and Grampa also picked cucumbers, eggplant and other veggies. Now it’s a trip to a little farm right on West 50th street in NYC where I bought a bunch of fresh picked veggies yesterday! I remember when they fig trees got wrapped in tar paper for the winter! They looked so scary in their black “suits” – but in the spring they came to life and it was amazing.
Wonderful memories Angela!
And believe it or not there was also a small grapevine in the backyard of the Bronx house I grew up in, and indeed my grandma made wine too , and no not with her feet!