Sometimes a garden isn’t so much as retreat as it is an attack.- Ian Finley Hamilton
I could post crime scene photos taken in my vegetable garden of the before/after veggies I’ve seen cut down in their prime. Beans mostly, but eggplant and even peppers and tomatoes. Yesterday, I found an optimistic list of the warm season veggies I proposed to plant in the public veggie garden. Heirloom tomatoes, peppers, some interesting grain and ornamentals like giant cardoon. Why bother? They’re gone, all gone. I could post a graphic depiction of the timeless battle: Una Chicka vs. Hostile World. But again, why bother? If a garden is supposed to be a peaceful refuge from the slings and arrows of outrageous animal fortune, than what the fuck? Like Tech Support guy is wont to say: it’s a wonder I’m not bitter.
Meanwhile, back at the real world, things are pretty wacky. Dick Cheney blamed Richard Clark for not catching the whole 911 thing. The man behind the curtain we were supposed to pay no attention to for the last administration is now ubiquitous, not to mention full of shit. No (undue) disrespect.
Meanwhile, back inside the house, I’m listening to Eddie Vedder saying if you have more than you need, you need more space. That wisdom consoles me. Ahhh, entitled aging boomers, protected from the recession by our defined benefit health care and pensions. Scolding our grown children for their failures in raising our frightened, over-protected and under-educated grandchildren. Forget that I was the generation that invented the term “latch-key child” (or Douglas Copeland, one or the other). Why should I bother to clean out the carport or the back room when I can always rent a personal storage pod to stash my overflowing stuff. For that matter, as long as I can get more stuff, I can always replant my veggies.Social commentary is generally sort of a sideline to my gardening blog. And although I’m usually sweet as a spoonful of honey on a warm Spring morning, I sometimes find myself ranting about the insult du jour. Some days, it’s just to hard to ignore what’s happening outside the gate as I cower inside my garden, looking for some place to bury my treasures against the coming rough days.
So going outside to hand water this afternoon was equal parts of genuine peace slash contentment, and impotent rage at the essential cruelty of an uncaring universe. Good thing I don’t have a job.
