Saturday, November 15, 2008

The garden

I had decided now was the time to prepare a spot for next years garden.  I had not done one this past summer because we were planning on doing some major excavation and would be tearing everything up.  I planted in what will be flower beds around the house.  But the excavation didn't happen due to a lack of funds and I want a garden next year so it will just have to be put in a place out of the path of trucks and equipment.

I spoke to the neighbor about borrowing a rototiller and getting some manure from the pigs they kept throughout the summer.  Yesterday dawned bright and warm.  Imagine that in mid November in the Northeast?!  So I mowed, dealt with leaves and decided it was time to tackle the garden project.  J next door had prepared a wheel barrow full of pig shit for me so I was ready to go.  I headed home pushing the wheel barrow only to promptly dump it in the road.  FABULOUS!  Home again home again to get a shovel to deal with it.  With a little help and the suggestion that pulling it might work better, I was on my way.  Then back for the rototiller.  

First let me say that the rototiller was the homeowner type.  Small.  Small rototillers require a lot of work.  A lot of back breaking, muscle aching, teeth jarring work.  But it prevented me from having to rent one.  It's something like holding onto the horns of a bucking bronco and trying to guide it in some sort of a straight line, while pushing down to force the tines into the earth.  And just for the record, I do know that bucking broncos do not have horns, but it is the only description that gets the visual that I was striving for.

Let's just say it was an arduous task.  I am extremely sore.  By the end of the project I was covered in pig shit, dirt, grass and sweat.  But I finished it. and then W2 got home

Apparently I put it in a bad spot.  This wasn't what we agreed to.  I will have to do it all over again.  He did offer to rent me the biggest rototiller available but regardless I feel defeated.  I worked my ass off but it was wrong.

I couldn't remember where we had talked about but put it in a nice bright sunny spot on the edge of our property, leaving room for at least one pass of the lawn mower.  But I was wrong.  I seem to be wrong more often than anything these days.

The weather is warm again today.  The perfect weather to dig in the correct location, but I am too sore.  Tomorrow will start with the coldest weather we have experienced thus far this Fall.  The true beginning of Winter.  My window has closed for prepping for a garden.  

I am sad and frustrated.

No comments: