Returning to the earth

 

Today the weather was wonderful.  Mid-60s and sunny.  Not a lot of wind.  I decided to finally begin a task my wife and I have been talking about for a number of years.  I pulled out my electric tiller, and proceeded to ‘break ground’ and prepare it for a small garden.  When I started the tiller and began the process of breaking through the grass and moss, I was no longer a 41 year old but a 16 year old tilling the family garden. 

Growing up, my family was part of a co-op of sorts.  There were 3-4 families who all worked together on the garden.  Over the years, the other families stopped but my family continued on.  The warm weather was a signal to us to go out to where the garden was (it was on the property of one of the other co-op families.  They continued to let us garden there after they stopped actively working the garden in return for a small amount of produce) and begin preparing the ground for another season.  We would till and rake the ground.  We would then come out later and begin the planting.  We would grow green beans, peas, potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, squash, zucchinis, carrots, and beets.  After planting (in northern Minnesota that would be Memorial Day weekend), we would go out every two to three days to check progress, weed, and when the time was right to harvest.  The season would end with another tilling, to prepare for the next year.

This process was much more exhausting, even though the area worked was significantly smaller.  Part of this of course is due to age.  Part of this was no doubt due to the fact that the electric tiller is smaller and less effective than the gas tiller I used growing up.  The other part if it was I had never done an actual breaking of ground like that before.  The years gardening growing up I was always working on land already broken.  This spot (you can see tires in the front – it was a garden at some point) has been overgrown with grass since we moved in twelve years ago (has it been that long already?).

I have hopes for this area.  The soil is darker and appears to be richer than what I grew up with, and it’s early in the growing season.  I know since this is the first year it’s tilled for growing it’s going to be difficult.  We’ll see how it goes.