Guest Gardener

Sometimes when you can’t quite figure out where to start, or maybe which particular plant is best for your zone, or if maybe you don’t even know if your soil is ready for gardening, you turn to someone who has done the work already, someone who has a little dirt under their nails, a little sweat on their brow and a blister or two to show for the work.  You look at their garden and see the things you like, and also the things that don’t quite fit your taste, and you ask them, “how do I do this?”

You must dig in your garden, deep, until you get to all the roots.  Sometimes you need to dig alone, for days.  Other times, you want help and company so you can fling the mud at someone or smush it until it’s dust and your frustrations, anger, fears, and pain are dissolved too.  I challenge you to dig deeper my friend.  We’re all here to support you as you do.  Don’t be afraid.  Be honest.  Be truthful.  Be YOU. Just begin with you.  The rest will come.

Those were the words my Guest Gardener had to say.  Dig.  Don’t fear.  Be true.  Begin at the beginning.  Have you ever heard better suggestions for redoing your garden?  I think not.

My dearest Guest Gardener, with you standing by to hand over your favorite tools for me to borrow, I’ll surely be able to plant something that blooms year round.

And for my kaba who feels connected to me through this gardening project? Yeah, it’s your strength that I carry in my heart…

Today weeds, tomorrow (or next year) tall strong sunflowers.

Who buys this stuff?

I’m not a professional gardener.  I have been playacting at it for so long that I thought I was top notch.  I’d pull a weed and feel satisfied.  I’d plant a new flower, stand in awe of it’s beauty while it bloomed, but forgot about it when it faded.

The one true thing I knew for certain about gardening was that I needed “amend” my soil.  I needed to fill it with nutrients and moistured holding elements.  I knew that I wanted it to be an organic garden, nothing artificial or fake, just pureness and the simplicity of natural growth.

The problem is that I think I got a bad load of fertilizer.  I just used whatever I had on hand to mix into what was already there, and then I threw on a bunch of stuff I’d read about or heard about.  I figured I couldn’t add too much “good” stuff.  But it turned out all wrong.  My garden smells to high heaven and I can’t even hardly bear to get out there into it. 

This is not your everyday smelly fertilizer.  This is not the scent wafting on the wind from the fields that makes you hold your nose and grimace.  This is no simple spreadable manure.  This is bad shit.

Something is rotten and putrified in there.  Something is half alive feeding on itself, eating up my efforts and destroying my will.  Something stomach churning, fume producing, wet, sticky, toxic.

Is this it? Is it just that I handled it so badly and messed it up so hugely that even I don’t want to go step around in it for fear it will suck me down and consume me?  Do I put on my gas mask, my HEPA suit, and go out there with a rake and stir it up until it dries out or do I seal it off and walk away to let it consume itself?

It’s not like I was the only one.  He pulled a weed or two, and even planted many pretties.  And when it came time to unload and fling the fertilizer to all the corners, I didn’t see him hesitate.  We both did it.  And as much as I want to leave it now, he wants to cover it up with something else and pretend it didn’t happen. 

I can’t see that working out very well.