AND WE'VE GOT TO GET OURSELVES BACK TO THE GARDEN is my Entire History, so far, of Husbandry of the Land: Gardening...right now, in time, I have five pots of Living Green...but once upon a many times...I had a Garden....

AND WE'VE GOT TO GET OURSELVES BACK TO THE GARDEN

My grandpa Amann had a huge garden in Genesee Depot, Wisconsin, flowing down a hill in the real countryside. It had a rose garden section. a small vegetable garden. lots of grass to play on. flowers all around the house. Hanging from a large branch of a tree, was a wonderful swing. I must have seen plenty of gardens before his, but Grandpa's and Gramma's home was the first I can remember...

Mom had simple gardens all around the houses in Illinois... but it is the vegetable gardens in the backyards that I remember best...the one on Union Avenue in St. Charles was my favorite...the corn rows were banked by a row of Flocks, a whimsical Midwestern spray of tiny, delicate flowers with a lovely perfume. I used to like to lie on the ground between that last cornrow among the Flocks, and just smell them and listen to the corn leaves crackle as they grew!...the tomatoes and green beans and corn of the Midwest are not to be confused with these three veges any where else on the planet...they are simply the best...

In the Midwest, though, all gardens and lawns come with a price: weeding. The Work of Weeding is no joke. It is painstakingly hard labor. I still have an active dislike of any tool that resembles a Weeder: that snake-tongue at the end of the long rod and the wooden handle. Held in your dominant hand. plunged into the ground next to the invisible root, which went down to China, of course. The other hand, gloved, pulls at the base of the plant. while, one wriggles and wrangles at the root, which does not, does not, want to come 'up'. Weeds are merciless survivors. there are thousands more of them after every rain. because, of course, of that batch of em last fall that you didn't pull out until after they went to seed. Weeds are the Rulers of the Plant World, in the moist, hot Midwestern Summer, anyway....

Portage, Wisconsin...Bumpity Road Farm. We had two gardens on the twenty acres of land there, for seven years. Ten acres were in share-cropping with a neighbor, for corn...the other ten boarded on the Game Reserve for the region, so it was left wild. It had a sweet tiny pond where there was a little running spring with watercress year round...then, a tiny fenced-in flower garden in a circle right in front of the garage, which we had made into a cozy house...and towards the main road, before the red barn, next to the chicken coop, was the Vegetable Garden.

I still have a picture of the Kid's Dad tilling that plot. It was as large as any other Truck Garden in the area. Truck Gardens being ones that produce enough food to preserve for the family, and to sell some for profit besides. We were trying to cut costs and be a bit more self-sufficient...also, it was a lot of fun, in spite of being a lot of work!

We raised string beans, pole beans, carrots, radishes, tomatoes, corn, cucumbers, pickles/cukes, green peppers, hot peppers, dill, basil, summer squash, winter squash, beets, peas, red cabbage, green cabbage, brussel sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower, parsnips, rutabagas, raspberries, strawberries, goose berries, blue berries, black berries, ice burg lettuce, leaf lettuces, kale, collards, mustard greens, peanuts, red onions, green onions, scallions, yellow onions, white onions, garlic, zucchini, potatoes, and even amaranth, for the seeds! In our little orchard we raised apples, pears, apricots, and peaches.

We ate fresh in season, and then I'd preserve and can, freeze or dry everything in sight that animals, insects, weather changes, or time didn't take away! With the 'game' coming into our part of the corn field, and fishing at Mill Pond, a short walk away, we ate very well...We had three little pigs as well. We'd trade one for fresh beef, had one put by for us into cuts and hams and sausage-grind. We'd trade the other for the butcher's work. The Kid's Dad caught one of the chickens every week from the coop, and we had fresh chicken to eat. The others were layers, of course, so we ate eggs constantly. Down the road was a milking farm, and we traded eggs for gallon jars of milk with fresh cream clotted on top! The game was pheasant, the yearly deer, squirrel, and an occasional wayward goose or duck flying over to the game reserve....

The Farm Ladies of Wisconsin really taught me everything I know through this very day, about Gardening. how to decide on purchases of seeds and seedlings and plants. how to prepare soil. how to 'amend' soils. how to figure out whether a soil was acid or alkaline, and what to do about it. how to water the crops effectively. when and how to pinch off and trim. when and how to weed. how to compost and mulch. when to fertilize plants and how to avoid heavy "feedings". how to deal with insects using the fewest chemicals. how to protect crops at harvest from animal feastings. when to harvest. how to use the harvest fresh. which parts of the vegetable to preserve. by canning. by pickling. by drying. by fruit cellaring. by freezing....

I owe a great portion of my love of the land to these women...especially Aunt Verna, a taciturn, tough woman of few words, who taught me most of the preserving skills I can do practically in my sleep, to this very day. She even taught me how to milk a cow (they had eight), and how to store the milk in their wonderful Spring House, with a real stream running through it to keep the milk fresh and cool in its stainless steel cans. I learned to churn, wash, dry, and mold butter with her. I have all the equipment for that as well, here in California. I even learned to make rag rugs and to sew on a treadle machine from this great old traditionalist! She was among the last of an old breed...the Women Pioneers, legendary in their own hard-working, conservative ways of life....

Then came my single-parent years, and only occasionally did a garden get my attention...
When we first moved to California, we had a big garden in our first backyard of our little yellow house under a huge redwood tree. We even had the first Compost Pile registered in the city of Oakland! I learned to raise all the California veges in that garden... they were all the ones of the Midwest, but they grow differently in California! Zucchinis can take over your entire yard if left unharvested...tomatoes come and go too fast...root crops damp-off, especially onions. Berries take over the fences and window frames...if there is a clump of bamboo nearby, you have a jungle to deal with within a week. Roses bloom two to three times a year. oranges can be picked all year, practically. lemons too. Loquats. No gooseberries. Blackberries are considered the worst pest possible, but are totally delicious every time...garlic thrives. corn is horrible and bland...if it even grows at all...peppers stay small...it's simply not hot enough here on the coast, so, you have to plant at just the right time, nurture the plants like crazy. harvest right away when just ripe. And then, there are the Snails...

Snails and Slugs are all over California. In fact, all the way north from LA through the western coasts of Canada, Snails and Slugs...everywhere. They eat, of course, every thing green and tender, or even not-so-tender, in sight. They leave slime behind as well. Some people love them anyway. Can't say I was ever too merciful...I surrounded my gardens with fireplace ashes, sand, and salt...and cups of beer set into the ground for them to fall into and drown. I'd go out at night and pick them off the plants and throw them into the street. I am very mean around Snails...we don't have slugs here in the Bay Area, but I would kill them in a flash...I guess the Buddhist Way is not happening any lifetime soon, for me!

For a few years of the seventies, I had a little business called "Sparkle Plenty Gardening"...I advised on garden planning, mainly for vegetable gardens, and pruned trees for part of my income! I had little cards made up, and advertised by word-of-mouth...I really enjoyed pruning and teaching folks about their trees and bushes and fruit trees generally...I gave up the business as I needed more money as I became a single parent, and I returned to Nursing full-time...besides. I had actually scared myself by falling out of a tree branch that was eight feet or so 'up'! I had been lucky nothing was broken, except my ego!

In the eighties, I decided to really learn to be a "Gardener" , hopefully an Organic Gardener who would learn to master the arts needed to raise vegetables in this strange Marine/Mediterranean Climate Zone of such mixed possibilities...

There is a farm north of us in Willets, connected with the Ecology Center on the Peninsula...they teach all the techniques necessary, in a series of workshops, to have a basic skills to be an Organic Gardener...The classes are all wonderful! We learned to double-dig and prepare raised beds. we learned how to mulch and compost. How to companion plant. how to raise each plant close to its fellows, in relationship to the chemistries of the soil, the heat, the sun, the water, the winds, and each other. Such wonderful gardening ways, with such successes when harvest comes!

I even got to belong to an Experimental Group that was planting a corn crop south down the San Francisco Peninsula. The leader was a great guy, who had trained under John Jeavons, the director of the Ecology Center programs I had attended. He guided us through all of his ideas about raising corn in a marine environment...We tilled and sowed and weeded and fertilized and harvested, all summer. It was much fun! We all got to take corn home at the end, to grind into meal: delicious stuff! He was going to Illinois, to buy a farm, that fall. I gave him an odd gift, for good luck on his farm...

A friend of my husband's worked for a US Congressman who was very liberal. He sponsored the Dalai Lama coming to Washington, DC, to speak with Congress people about Tibet. She was in charge of the arrangements. Before she left for DC, she asked me if I wanted to give her anything for the Dalai Lama to bless for me. I said Sure, and gave her a pretty stone I had taken from the farm up in Willets, where I had trained. To my great surprise, she returned the stone to me when she came back, saying that he had blessed it, giggling! She had a picture of him blessing the stone! What fun!
I gave the stone to our leader along with the picture, for good luck on his Illinois Farm Adventure. He was very pleased to have it and the picture too!
I thought of Illinois Farms and Vegetable gardens and corn...so far away....

At that time, my second husband owned forty acres with a year-round spring in Gualala, on the coast north of the Bay Area, close to Mendocino. It was beautiful land! It had a large coastal redwood grove, and huge ferns around the spring. We planted and tended a ten-tree - mainly apples - orchard up there year round...weeding, pruning, watering during the summer...there was a little seasonal pond there, and I built a Japanese bridge over it with Pop's help...

And, I had a garden, a Real Garden again! It was on Pop's Back Yard Property... Pops - Walter - was my Best Friend for over thirty-five years... For over twenty years I had his "Back Forty" as he called it, one of his thirty by twenty-five square foot raised beds, filled with all of organic gardening vegetable and flower experiments! Pops was very intrigued. He was a completely conventional gardener, and, an excellent one, with a huge half-acre garden going up the hill behind his three houses, filled with azaleas, rhododendrons, flowers, trees, paths, roses, and a year-round running creek with two picnic areas. One of our housemates and one of my daughters even got themselves married in that wonderful garden!

He had four raised beds, as I said. One was for corn only...he saved his Burpee Gold seed year after year. One was for sweet peas, strawberries, and green peas, and the gladiolas and dahlias. The third was for tomatoes, carrots, onions, and green beans...he'd rotate his crops, otherwise, fertilizers, tilling, rows, everything was traditional. My companion planting, composting (eventually he got into composting way more that I did!), green-fertilizing, double-digging, and close-planting techniques really threw him! He very much admired my lack of bugs, lack of weeds, and my huge yields though! One thing I could never get him to do, was to move from overhead sprinkling to drip...even though his ways obviously damped-off plants, especially in more foggy years. He was stubborn about that! I raised tomatoes, herbs of all kinds, and got into heirloom varieties of lettuces, carrots, onions, garlic, potatoes...

Thenn my second husband and I bought a house, in Oakland, not far from Pop's property on Trestle Glen...this one was on Rhoda Ave, down the hill from the huge Mormon Temple, which we referred to as "The Castle".... I had a small back yard with huge gum trees, two paths on either sides, a big front yard with a huge Dierdre Cedar, and a deck on the master bedroom side with a hot tub! It had been one of the original farm houses in the Fruitvale area of Oakland, and was right over an underground stream bed. So, the basement would flood in the winter rains...but the gardening was great! I planted roses on one side of the house. did container gardening in the back yard and built a deck. planted trumpet vines and did containers on the hot-tub deck side. planted roses along the front yard fence. planted and tended an apricot and a plum tree. planted and tended a shade garden under the Dierdre Cedar...and, kept up my Back Forty on Pop's property as well! A Heaven of Gardens! Years later, that Garden is still tended and has been developed into a huge Japanese Garden, by my son, who bought the Family House after our divorce, and lives there, raising his family in that garden setting...and, rabbits in the backyard, just as I did, as well!

Living as a live-in girl friend at my boyfriend's home in Montclair, California, was an experience in gardening as well...he already had a huge house garden front and back, all set the way he wished, and gardened it himself...he did allow me my containers and redwood planters I had built...I filled them with herbs of all kinds, as usual, flowers, strawberries, and lettuces...a little kitchen garden...and, of course, I still tended and harvested from my Back Forty at Pop's!

Towards the end of our relationship, I worked for about a year on a friend's 'farm' in Yolo County...he was a gentleman farmer, who irrigated a couple of acres of almond trees...a new little orchard! He grew row after row of organic vegetables as well...he raised chickens from chicks in the bathtub of the trailer he lived in whenever he was working his land. In San Francisco, he was, probably is still, an CPA.... the work was demanding and constant, and it was very, very hot in the summer. After weeding and hoeing and irrigating (that is, endlessly repairing his feeder-tube systems), we would swim about in the nice cold irrigation pond with it's reeds and aquatic plants all around. That was lovely...We were 'just friends', but I was busy there, being in a 'garden' of huge proportions...and the Spring and Fall there were lovely...I took many pictures of that farm, and the gentle beauty of the land still startles me. He was a gentle soul, too, a little blunt at times, but wry and kind. A good person to work with...we would listen to Prairie Home Companion on the way home, after eating at a wonderful local Mexican Restaurant, where we seemed to be the only gringos in sight. He had a friend, June, who lived on the farm 'one over', who still had a dirt floor for her house. It was a very good experience, all in all! 'Except for the chickens...they all died. An animal or more got them all...only a few white and black feathers remained...that's the nature of life on a farm, all too often!

The whole time I was gardening, I continued to preserve and can or dry foods to "put by"...I carted my equipment from Illinois and Wisconsin around everywhere! canner. jars. labels. rims. tops. jar lifters. recipes...lately, I'm down to jams and jellies and chutneys - I preserve them with my daughter, since she has an orange tree and a lemon tree and a big garden... everyone seems to still enjoy them mightily!

Then, I married my third husband...we had one little garden for a year or so, and raised vegetables...then we lived up in the hills, where the winds from the Golden Gate blow in from the ocean across the bay, and smash into every living thing! Only very, very hardly plants grow in the East Bay hills!...so, mainly container plants for some years...We helped my second daughter put in a large vegetable garden a couple of times, in her five large raised beds...the harvests have been very good...especially the lettuces, and, of course, inevitably, the zucchinis!

Before we leave the garden, a bit about Bees....While I had the Back Forty at Pop's, I had joined the Alameda County Bee Keeping Association, and had joined together with the 'president' at the time, a small Hawaiian/Irish American woman with a willful, energetic spirit and two sons to raise...she helped me set up my first hive on Pop's property. We worked her three hives in Oakland, and mine, together for eight years. We even produced our own honey products, mainly the Eucalyptus Honey and some pollen...then I suffered a slew of stings from a wild swarm that I had been trying to hive...the multiple stings led to an anaphylactic shock reaction that was so severe, that I had to give up the Bees. I had really loved working with those little ladies! Fussing over their little mini-cities in the 'supers' and their wonderful, honey and pollen neighborhoods on the 'frames', was so much fun! A warm hive smells a lot like bread just out of the oven, all toasty and covered with dripping honey! I was only around bees again one more season...on the farm in Yolo County. My friend kept bees all around the Almond Orchard...I would help him with the equipment, at a safe distance, carrying my 'bee kit' with it's epinephrine injectable in it...just in case a bee might sting me....

Here in my 'new' apartment with my new fellow, we have a small deck, with plants on it...my daughter may or may not put in her vegetable garden this year... I hope she does. Of course, I will help her 'garden',but here friend Robert does most of that now...Gardens are never far from my mind...Even in 2006, when we spent ten weeks in Europe, many, many of my photos were of gardens...

In a garden, working in the soil, I feel closer to the planet and every farmer and gardener upon it.
I fight against the Ownership of the world's Seeds by MegaAgricultural Monopolies...I fight for potable Water for all Living Things....
I feel close to the plants, their seasons and their natures, their lives and their harvests for our foods and for our pleasure...for their right to Live, simply because they share this planet with us so freely...for so little in return from most of us....

When we are working the Land, as the Singer Joni Mitchel wrote...
We are Stardust.
We are Golden...and so I say...

and so I Sing:
(loudly...and with Joy):

We've got to get ourselves

Back to the Garden....