My husband has loved gardening all our married life. Me, not so much. The garden looks beautiful when he first puts it in. Rich, brown, soft tilled soil. Straight rows marked with white string. Plots and squares all organized and pleasing for my mind to look at. Since he is not here during the week, it was my job to keep it watered and tended until he came back on the weekend. I actually found pleasure in walking among the rows, sprinkling the straight rows and perfect squares with water.
And then the garden grew. This garden is insane. In fact, it’s not a garden at all. It’s a cross between an actual farm and a jungle. The beautiful, straight rows I cultivated have disappeared into an enormous tangle of green. It’s wet out there. It’s buggy out there. It’s muddy out there. And now it’s my job during the week to go out and keep the garden picked. This is a whole lot harder than watering. Tomatoes, cucumbers, and squash all hide under huge green leaves, along with the mosquitoes. Going out into this rainforest called a garden, requires massive preparation equal to that of a beekeeper. In fact, next year I’m getting a beekeeper suit.
Yesterday, as my husband was explaining what my garden job was this week, I made up my mind to “like it”. To give it a chance. There has to be some “Joie de vevre” somewhere in that tangled mass. I thought, maybe getting out and kind of being “one with the earth” would bestow joy on my heart.
Wrong. I gave it my best shot. I sprayed on massive amounts of bug spray and wore long pants and a long sleeved shirt and ventured into this mini-wilderness that occupies my yard. Mosquitoes and black gnats quickly decided my hair was a great place to hide out. My feet were muddy and soaked through, but I pressed on. Then I saw them. Yellow tomatoes. Cool. I quickly forgot about my itching and complaining. I picked the yellow tomatoes, along with mountains of red ones, plum ones, and itty bitty cherry ones. Then I attacked the cucumber and squash section and returned to the house with this huge harvest.
The colors and freshness of the bounty made me feel just a bit healthier, but the real joy will be in trying a yellow tomato for the first time. (Sort of like that time they came out with green ketchup.) Is it really going to taste like a red tomato or will it have it’s own special flavor?
I will have to wait until dinner tomorrow to find out, but the important thing is that I found “Joie de vevre” in something I knew I was not going to like doing. This proves that the “joy of life” hides everywhere. Even under huge green leaves.
And so, as another day goes by, I can’t wait to see what I will find in that garden tomorrow, and….I have written.
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