on gardening as a slacker

Every morning, at 0530A, an alarm sounds, triggering my body into wakefulness. Being a spoiled, snot-nosed American brat and a generally worthless individual, and seeing as how I endeavor to shrink my bad and to grow my good characteristics, I have taken on the awesome responsibility of gardening. That row cover of tulle draped tightly over spans of freshly-split bamboo? Installed yesterday. That Third-World-style drip irrigation unit my missionary uncle sent me via insured mail five weeks ago? Installed last weekend. Yes, though I sometimes take a bit longer to get things done than I might ought to, I am learning a lot from the three separate gardens growing on this dacha's property, among them one that was donated, one that I am growing for a silent partner, and one that I grew from seed. Add to these two fledgling blueberry bushes (which are stuck in a sort of limbo) and one string-bean plant peeking from beneath an upside-down planter hanging on the back patio, and the opportunities for work become endless.

Every morning, as rosy-fingered Dawn is caressing the world with the promise of day but before the chariot of the sun-god has crested the horizon, I haul water up from the stream to moisten the earth within the various plots. And again in the evening, when Helios begins to dip toward the horizon and the birds start flocking home to roost, the soil drinks deeply of the cool running brook. To my great fortune, a good friend gave me a stack of Mother Earth News magazines, and, while foxing around in the barn, I found a trove of Organic Gardening magazines from the 1970s and '80s that I have been reading and studying, and from which I have gleaned much valuable knowledge. What, you ask, is the most useful bit of advice I have come across? Beyond the row-covers of tulle and the genius of drip irrigation, the most useful advice has been to never leave ground uncovered, i.e. that one should always cover one's soil with at least some form of mulch (grass clippings, leaves, layers of cardboard) so that it does not bake too badly in the sun and so that it is always gaining some sort of nutrients as things above it decompose.

I think back often to the lessons my parents once taught me, long ago, before they died, and I am tempted to chide myself for not remembering them, for not having paid better attention to what they said, and for not heeding their advice, but, instead, I bask happily in the memories and try to learn as much as I can from the soil sitting in my hands, from the plants growing in the ground, from the wind, from the rain, and from the subtle interplay that occurs when all of these elements conspire together, somehow, to make life. Among the most enduring lessons I am learning is this: no matter how barren soil may seem, it has the seemingly endless capacity to bounce back. This is but my first time doing this sort of work, but, by Liberty, I like it.

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