|
|
Being Green, Gardening and Why
I Blame my Kid
By: Patrick Murray
So often you hear
"It is all my parents fault." Occasionally I even hear my mother
taking the blame for my occasionally caustic personality, though I'm fairly
certain I've never blamed her for my questionable vocabulary and sharp tongue.
Not that she is shy by any means just a little more diplomatic.
In
this case I'm blaming my kid instead of the other way around. It all started
in the spring while the youngest was in the second grade. She came home all
wound-up about needing to save the earth. In fairness I've been a pretty
green guy for years. I've used organic lawn care products long before most
people had the environment as top of mind. Speaking of organic I've bought
organic when it’s available for the past decade and local all my life. What I
wouldn't say is that by any means am I an environmentalist. In fact while
I've claimed to be a lot of things an environmentalist has never been one of
them. Buying green due to a fear of cancer and a shorter life, buying local
because I liked the farmers market, the fresher products and the people
selling me my veggies. In both cases I did the right thing by accident and
not as a conscious act.
So
anyway here she comes bouncing along at nine years old excited, full of great
ideas and decked out in her often-present pig tails. First she tells me how
much wood is wasted and placed in land fills rather than being used for other
projects or recycles. I don't question the percentage or amount she quotes to
me like gospel. All I say is "oh really" before she launches in to
more statistical evidence provided by a well-meaning science teacher. OK fine
she's been heard I get it and leave the 2x4's and 1x3's from the recently
disassembled dog cage in the basement and I built a poorly constructed,
unattractive but completely functional trellis complete with reused untangled
kite string for the beans and climbing flowers to crawl up. My mother's father
would have been so proud it looked like a contraption he would have built out
of whatever was laying around. In his case not because he was an
environmentalist or because he had a daughter or granddaughter telling him to
"recycle" but because it was there and paid for and there was no
reason to get rid of perfectly good wood.
So we recycled the nail laden and hole filled boards into our new creation.
Sure money was save because I fully planned to go out and buy lattice or
trellis for the plants this year. She proudly helped me finish the building
by pounding the last nails in, tying off the last strings and running inside
to get her mother to see our monstrosities that were placed in a front garden
behind a garden statue that was a gift from her side of the family. My wife
came out, smiled at her reassuringly since she was so proud of the crooked
ladder looking things right before asking how quickly the plants would grow
to cover them.
I did what any wise husband would shrugged and guessed "June maybe
July" being very none committal.
She smiled and told our daughter what a great idea it was and then shot me a
look questioning my abilities as a carpenter. Which while I dabble at things
is yet another thing I've never claimed to be. The beans and flowers have
done particularly well. We'll just chalk it up to a little extra rain and
good karma.
So it’s fall and being one to never waste soil I practice a non-traditional
yet completely natural way of composting. Now sure I could buy one of those
nifty composting bins to help the process. My mother and father have several
of them. Frankly I'm too cheap for that. Instead, cutting the plants as they
brown, I put them in pile with old potting soil in an un-planted spot in a
garden. Preferably, but not necessarily, obscured by a large stone statue,
rock or large patch of plants where it can break down "naturally".
So when the fall harvest of sunflowers began, we took the heads, less the
seeds and put them in a spot next to the herb garden. It was the same place I
unceremoniously put the manure laden soil mixture from my previous two years
indoor lettuce planting. To the left of the bronze garden faerie, the
chocolate bell pepper plants (yes I know they aren't herbs) by the basil,
behind the lemon thyme.
And so it sat as as we cut the long green leafy stalks into foot long lengths
so they would fit, and more importantly, not draw too much attention.
Chatting back and forth without the distraction of TV, video games or
computers, quiet and quality uninterrupted time. That is where the lesson
accidentally came in about letting plants go to seed so we could use those
seeds to create new plants for next year. Talk about how such things work in
nature and why it works that way. And then finally about how reusing parts of
the old plants helps keep the soil rich. See it isn't about making a
political statement, it doesn't come from a deep need to change the world. It
comes from nothing more than good old fashioned horse sense and helping to do
what nature does in its own way to improve your own gardening results.
Sure there are missteps along the way like unattractive structures behind the
wife's favorite garden statue. Or like when the mother in law comes over and
grumbles at me before the sun comes up" Why in the world are your coffee
grounds wet and weak?" The reason being? She used the can labeled
"GROUNDS" meaning used coffee that once its sweet nectar had been
consumed served a better purpose in my pile of rotting vegetation, sprinkled
on the lawn or as part of my cow manure and compost tea I make to water the
occasional growing thing.
But in the end of it all sometimes a little youthful idealism, being a touch
cheap, and acting like my old farmer grandfather intersects with lofty ideals
without even trying and for this I blame my kid.
A few last words of advice. Mother in laws usually survive weak wet used
coffee and even understand and forgive you on occasion. An upfront warning
about how the plants might just completely cover the wife's favorite garden
statue for 4 or 5 months if all the seeds take and grow like bad weeds might
be warranted. And finally, remember those informal compost piles you've been
hiding throughout the gardens well in relative obscurity? Well the one out by
the Fairy Statue and herbs I've got to tell you something about... the bad
news is that the compost pile has taken on a new purpose quite accidentally.
The soil from the lettuce planters, it's sort of sprouted with all the other
good stuff we put on top of it, a little rain and some nice cool nights. On
the up side we're going to have a bumper crop of home grown mixed field
greens this fall. Well that and it is all Elise's fault!
_________________________________________________________________________
Organic
Gardening Articles: http://www.organicgardenarticles.com/
|
|