It took me two hours to do a 20-minute job today. This is why:
I got my gardening gloves, my packet of pole bean and pea seeds and my little garden trowel and started off to do some planting. The beans were to be planted along the inside of the fence in the garden beside the front porch. The peas were destined for the bed in front of the porch where the tulips had shown forth their beauty and then gone to tulip heaven.
Before I could get started planting peas, I had to deal with the grass along the edge of the bed that was ankle deep. I snatched out clumps of grass with my hands. I remember Mom doing that when I was a little girl. I thought she just did a few because she was on her way out of the garden and didn't have the clippers with her. I have found that the snatch method works better than any tool I have tried. It's faster, too.
When I got to the tulip bed, the next thing I had to do was prepare the soil. Trouble is there were weeds in the soil. Even though the bed is only eight feet long, pulling the weeds was time consuming. In fact, for every weed I pulled, I discovered another one hiding behind it.
Well, I couldn't work up the soil with all of those headless tulip stems flopping from side to side. I had to go to the barn ro get the trimmers to lop them off. Then I needed to gather up all of the trimmings and the weeds and dispose of them.
As I began to carve out a row for the pea seeds, I could see that the soil was too compact for that. I went back to the barn to get a tool to work up the soil. By now, I was getting pretty thirsty, so I went inside the house to get a glass of water. While I was at it, I realized that I was getting a bit hungry, so I had some cheese and crackers.
I decided to plant the pole beans and let the soil in the pea patch dry a little bit. The sun was shining brightly and I was getting hot, so I took a few minutes to rest.
The next step was to plant the pole beans. There were no weeds in the garden, since it had been tilled recently, but the dirt was not soft and squishy like the grass in front of the pea patch, so I had to go to the barn and get a kneeling pad to protect my knees.
I was then able to make a row and plant the pole beans.That went smoothly. I was now able to plant the peas. That, also, went smoothly. That's funny. The planting only took 20 minutes.
I now have to put up a possum fence. Possums love to dig up newly planted flowers and vegetables. I hope it doesn't take two hours to do it.
Dorothy is the author of two books—“Miles and Miracles” and “Getting It All Together “. You can purchase a book or send a comment by emailing her at dorothybutzknight@gmail.com