[Kathryn’s note: This summer I had the pleasure of meeting editor/publisher Stephen Morris at SolFest, put on by the Solar Living Center, where Stephen was presenting. SolFest is an annual event dedicated to renewable energy and sustainable living. Stephen is the first guest blogger for Plant Whatever Brings You Joy!]

Famous Last Words

by Stephen Morris

Part I–Spring

Next year in the garden I won’t plant my seeds too early just because I am excited by a warm day in April. I will wear a long sleeve shirt while pruning roses, raspberries, and blackberries. I will open seed packets the right way so that they reseal. I won’t just rip off the tops, then wonder why my pockets are filled with spilled seed.

Next year in the garden I will read the instructions before planting the seeds. That is, I will read the instructions IF I remember my reading glasses. Gardening is yet one more activity that now requires those damn things.

Next year in the garden I won’t read the newspapers as I lay down the mulch, and I will take off my muddy boots before coming into the kitchen.

I won’t shout “Ignition!” when I see the first green dots of germination. I won’t pump my fist and say “Yes!” when green shoots of garlic poke through the hay. I will take it in stride, with the right stuff of a master gardener.

Next year in the garden I will keep detailed records of what I do, when, and where. I won’t mark planted rows with little sticks and kid myself that I will remember what I planted.

And I won’t plant too many zucchini, or too few. I promise.

Part II–Summer

Next year in the garden I won’t wander out after showering and changing clothes to admire my work and bend down to pluck just one errant weed, because I’ve learned that one good weed deserves another.

I won’t work with my shirt off, even though it feels so good, because I know the sun is bad for me. I will always put on sun screen (SPF 45 and wear a wide-brimmed hat).

I will make myself smile by singing “Inch by inch, row by row…”, and not once will I think about the Dow Jones Industrial Average. I will, however, wonder who the Red Sox will use as a fifth starter and marvel at the ability of David Ortiz to deliver in the clutch.

Next year in the garden I will do successive plantings so that I always have tender lettuce. I won’t say “What the heck,” and empty the rest of the packet.

I won’t plant peas in August that don’t have a prayer of bearing fruit before the frost. Next year in the garden I won’t curse potato bugs, but will accept my responsibility for the pests I attract. I will outwit potato bugs by not planting potatoes. Next year, that is.

I will de-sucker the tomatoes religiously, and I will build those groovy bent-wood trellises I saw in the gardening magazine. I will say a prayer when I eat the first red fruit.

I won’t let the rogue squash grow, thinking it might turn out to be the elusive “great pumpkin.”

Next year in the garden, at least once, I will strip off all my clothes, lie spread-eagled in the dirt and say “Take me, God, I’m yours!” Then I will take an outdoor shower, scrubbing every nook and cranny, and feel like the luckiest man on the face of the earth.

Part III–Fall

Next year in the garden, as I pull weeds, I won’t think that I coined the phrase “Nature abhors a vacuum.” (Who did coin that phrase, if not me?).

I won’t wonder why I planted mustard greens.

I will wear a long-sleeve shirt while pruning the roses. Did I already say that?

I won’t start the chipper-shredder “just to see if it will start,” then put through a sunflower stalk “just to see what happens,” especially when I am just killing time before we go out to dinner.

Next year I won’t bore visitors with extensive garden tours, filled with eloquent soliloquies on the virtues of compost. I won’t describe myself as the “poor man’s Eliot Coleman.”

I will pick the chard before it becomes tough and stringy.

I won’t stand speechless before a ten foot sunflower and marvel at the memory of pressing a single seed into the soil with my thumb. I won’t laugh out loud when I see three blue jays hanging upside down on the foot-wide seed pods, possessed by gluttony.

I won’t be disappointed when the Sox fall by the wayside, because I know there is always next year.

Next year in the garden, I will cover at the hint of frost.

I will plant my bulbs and garlic before the ground freezes, but I won’t cover them with mulch until the ground is hard and critter-proof.

I won’t pretend not to be disappointed when my garlic and cherry tomatoes fail to score ribbons at the Tunbridge World’s Fair.

Next year in the garden I won’t break into Joni Mitchell’s “Urge for Going” when I see a chevron overhead.

Part IV–Winter

Next year in the garden I won’t get delusional when I see this year’s seeds on sale. I won’t buy enough to feed all of central Vermont and I won’t think I’m a rich man as I flip through the colorful packets in January. I won’t question why I bought two types of turnips. I hate turnips.

I won’t delude myself into thinking I can grow seven varieties of pepper from seed.
I won’t buy seeds for inedible greens with exotic Japanese names.
I will store my squash properly, so they don’t rot.
I will give gifts of garlic and elderberry wine as if I am bestowing frankincense and myhrr (even though the elderberry wine sucks).
I won’t take it personally when I see how cheap garlic is at Costco.
I won’t check the mail for the first seed catalog the day after Christmas.
I will think good thoughts when we eat last summer’s pesto.

Next year in the garden I won’t think I am part of life’s great cycle just because I pee on the frozen compost.

Excerpted from The New Village Green (New Society Publishers, 2007). Stephen Morris is the editor and publisher of Green Living: A Practical Journal for Friends of the Environment.

Posted on October 3rd, 2007 by Kathryn
Filed under: Non Sequitur | 5 Comments »

One of my most cherished activities is found in the sheer luxury of being able to go into my garden in the early morning to pick the flowers that will grace my home, and the greens that will become part of my midday meal. All summer I have been blessed by the deep reds, oranges and all shades of yellow found in my reliable and persistent nasturtiums that continue climbing along the front stairs, wending their way into and around the assorted potted plants that live there. And the roses, oh, the roses! Huge, fragrant, (very) old dark red roses. Trellised Pepto-pink roses. Small yellow variegated ones. Treasures beyond belief. The pastel blue and yellow pansies. Tiny purple violets. Snapdragons. Honeysuckle. Lavender and pink clematis. Red sage. And rosemary, cilantro, oregano; the lettuces, and the treasured arugula! Yum!

And now all this is about to change. For it is Indian Summer. Harvest. It is seed gathering time, to help ensure that much of the above is all possible again next year.

My kitchen table is now literally awash in plates and bowls full of various seeds, all at different stages of drying. The soft, wispy white of Romaine and leafy lettuces. The dry tan pods of coriander. (Shall I plant or season with them? Coriander is cilantro, you know.) The miniature black seeds of the California poppy. Cream-colored round pods full of rows of flat, dry seeds from red, white and pink hollyhocks. Precious, wrinkled pale green nasturtium seeds, drying on a Portmerion plate. Fading purple stocks of amaranth unexpectedly yielding a plethora of shiny black seeds that spill across the paper towel where they are drying. And to my great delight, this morning I found the blue and purple morning glories that border my vege garden are full of round dry paper-thin pods, each carrying small triangular black seeds, so I gratefully gathered a nice handful of those and added them to the store. How wonderful! How promising! And free!

In the center of the table is a large bowl full of tomatoes. Red cherry, yellow cherry, Russian heirloom and Early Girls, the latter my first such crop and now to become a staple, for sure, so generous was their consistent bounty. Each of these juicy wonderful red and yellow fruits also offers the promise of seeds for next year, should I make this the year I actually learn how to do that! I think the yellow cherries would be my first choice, as they were the spectacular taste surprise of the season, no doubt. A kind local gardener, very active in seedsavers.org has sent me instructions for saving tomato seeds (which involves fermentation), so perhaps I will find the time and inclination.

To walk into the kitchen and be greeted by the plates and bowls of the seeds for my next garden is a wonderful, uplifting experience, I must tell you. Each bears the unfailing promise of abundance, of deliverance, of sustenance. Within each tiny seed is the profound miracle of the gift of life. It is staggering to contem-plate.

I find myself wondering how many people are actually practicing this. I’m imagining it is largely a lost practice and one actually somewhat in jeopardy, as (and I don’t want to dwell on this as it is quite sad and disturbing) there are actually people in companies who spend their time modifying plants that will not bear seeds, shocking an endeavor as that is, leaving consumers with no choice but to buy new seeds each year. Can you believe it? But, enough said about that, though the luxury of gathering seeds from one’s own garden perhaps has a slightly new importance when held in that light.

In the natural world, gathering seeds and having faith in their promise is precisely one of the great gifts of which we might avail ourselves if only our attentions were drawn in that precise direction. I recommend it!

Posted on September 19th, 2007 by Kathryn
Filed under: Plants | Comments Off on Indian Summer