I was cutting up vegetables on a cutting board on the counter, with Brio sitting by my feet. At one point I mis-cut something and murmured, "Oops!"
Brio immediately looked at the floor, expecting me to have dropped something yummy. So apparently he knows what the word "oops" means.
Which tells you how much I must say it.
It has been snowing for the past two days, and I know somewhere out there, there are people happily skiing, skating, dogsledding, snowshoeing, tobogganing, and playing hockey. All of those are thrilling, but my personal favourite winter sport is the forward-flip-full-body-tuck-and-roll-when-your-snowshovel-hits-a-crack-in-the-sidewalk event. If they would make it an Olympic sport, I could easily win the gold for my country.
Last fall, I sat down and wrote out what I was going to plant and where, keeping in mind crop rotation and companion planting and practicality and all of that. I inventoried what my family easts the most and what staples will help curb the grocery bill. And then the seed catalogues started coming in, and my plans have been tossed out the window.
I want to try Amsterdam celery, a type of leaf celery, in my hydroponics system. I want to plant Konika parsley even though it takes two seasons to mature. I want swathes of chia and sweetgrass and sorghum. There are about five types of cabbage I want to experiment with. There are clever herb ladders I want to build from old pallets. Melons bred to mature in northern climes. Tomatoes every colour under the sun. All of this while the little voice niggling in my head says, "You are going to be away a lot of this summer. How can you possibly do this?"
We have a couple of 2-week trips to take this summer. We have a church to renovate and its yard to maintain, 2 1/2 hours from our house. There's a stack of stained glass windows I need to restore. I will likely have grandchildren to care for. Somewhere in there, I have to squeeze in writing the novel that is way overdue. Oh, and oh yeah, I work full time.
How to tame the gardening impulse and balance out everything else I am supposed to be doing? Why have I arranged my life in such a way that I have to spend time doing all these other things, when what I really want to be doing is fitting cut-off pool noodles around the stems of my sunflowers and snapping green beans? What can I cut out so that I can devote more time to my passion of feeding people? Isn't that passion really the most important thing these days, as so many face hunger?
One idea I have is to avoid planting things like green beans and peas this year, because they require daily babysitting, whereas long-maturing things like pumpkins and sweet potatoes don't necessarily need as much attention. I've also considered planting the whole garden at home to something like oats or dry beans that take little care, and then borrowing a piece of land up by the church, so I can garden while I'm staying up there working on the renovations. No running back and forth worrying about the property I'm not at. Or I could find an apartment-dweller who is a frustrated farmer at heart who could use my garden at home in exchange for a share of the produce. I'll have to give it some serious thought when I'm in a better mood. Because if you asked me today, I feel like selling house and church, quitting my job, giving up writing, and disappearing into a remote acreage with a shovel and hoe and a pressure canner.
Nothing else is going to be accomplished. The new seed catalog for 2023 arrived in the mail today, I've dropped all plans, and I'm on the couch with a pen and a dream. Stuff I've never heard of. Plants I didn't think would grow in my area but apparently will. Old favourites and fond memories. Interesting stories of the first person to develop and grow a particular variety or strain. Things I can grow to feed foraging chickens or improve my soil. (I may have to get chickens just so I can grow this stuff. It sounds lovely.)
Is anyone else like this with seed catalogs? Are you suddenly tempted to get a hog just so you can grow Jerusalem Artichokes and mangles for it to dig up and eat? Do you find yourself dog-earring EVERY page in the catalog? Do you start planning what crop rotation to use in the garden or consider leaving one raised bed fallow or plant alfalfa in it as if you were running a 100-acre farm instead of a suburban back yard veggie patch? Don't you long to buy seed by the pound instead of the packet? Are you tickled at the thought of planting a miniature tall-grass prairie in a flower bed and having a tiny controlled prairie burn? Doesn't the very idea of maple sugaring equipment make you want to move to a woodlot in Quebec?
It's -48 celsius outside, snow on the ground, spring planting at least 4 months away, and I'm making lists.
My husband says the way I approach seed catalogs highlights the difference between us. He looks at the current existing yard and asks himself what he wants and what the yard needs to be at its best. Then he'll go to the catalog and look up those things. I, on the other hand, look at the catalog cover to cover, reading it like a novel, and I feel the tug to go buy 50 acres so I can plant some of everything in the book. Sorghum! Hulless oats! Chia! Daikon radish! Fat Hen! Timothy! Ground cherries! Chinese cabbage! Callaloo! Upland rice! Turmeric! Stevia! I mean, how can you possibly not grow your own stevia if given the chance?
My husband said I am free to go do just that -- buy fifty acres and grow everything my heart desires -- but I will be doing it as a single woman.
Sigh. So I'll rein myself in and try to be reasonable about what will grow where I am and on the scale I'm constrained by. I'll tuck aside the catalogs and soothe my passion by choosing one new thing to grow every year and try to control expectations and longings.
Maybe this year I'll try sorghum...
We once lived for about four months in a log cabin, and I came away from the experience filled with gratitude for simple things like flat walls to hang artwork on, kitchen cupboards, windows that open, a smooth floor babies can crawl on, and a furnace that works without having to get up and stoke it in the middle of the night.
This week I am staying up at the church we're renovating, and the experience has made me appreciative of all the little comforts I have back at home. Things like a functioning kitchen with a working sink, heat in every room, a front door that opens without a struggle, a fenced yard so I can just let the dog out to run without having to trudge out there with him every time. There's much good to be found here -- quiet, calm, space, light, air -- but much to be desired when it comes to warmth and comfort.
I think it's important once in a while to live uncomfortably, so that we're more fully aware of how good we generally have it every day. We tend to forget the warm world we swim in until we're yanked out into the chilly air.
