Daughter would approve

Even a short-timer's habits die hard. 

My dad had some kind of fishing boat, each a little smaller than the one before, well into his nineties. My mom used to read him the funnies every day, and tried to do so even in hospice, with three days left to her.

Daughter's little dog can only smell, her seeing and hearing having pretty much gone by the by, but she still checks every corner of the place, inside and out, before settling down to her all day nap.

I had gardens and fruit trees, and for awhile a downright microfarm, from about 1970 to 2022. I had built Daughter a few raised beds from scrap lumber, but, always traveling for the health department, she left them to me to fill up. I put in a crop or two of broadbeans, returning the chopped plants to the beds to build soil.

I'm sadly now one of the inheritors of Daughter's house, and no longer have the large gardens to which I had become accustomed. I'm also joining the ranks of those who spend most of their time sleeping in a recliner, due to lack of motivation and age-appropriate health concerns. I made noises to those around me that my gardening days were done.

But those beds out back did not stop calling to me. I wandered out to inspect them -- they had been taken over by a lush carpet of grass -- thought about things a bit, then on one of our furniture runs from the farm, brought over a couple of bales of straw. These had been intended as bedding for a poultry flock that had departed the world, and so were no longer needed where they were. In the autumn, I cut twine and threw straw flakes over all the grass, then as winter drew to a close, covered the beds with repurposed black poly to shut out any stray photons. 

In April, I pulled off the sheeting and found the straw had worked down a bit. No grass was in sight. I threw on a bagful of potting soil to each bed, smoothed it out, and began planting things.

There are deer in the neighborhood, who regard themselves as the landlords, so I wrapped the row of beds in scrap fencing. Anticipating (correctly) a record hot summer, I also had brought from the farm some 36" by 50' shade cloth, and hung some above and some vertically to the west of the beds. 

 

We were back in the veggie business, in a tiny way.

This is hardly tinyfarming, or even enough production to dent the grocery bill really, but along with the dozen or more fruit trees I planted seven years ago, it has done two things: it supplements our diet with fresh organically grown tomatoes, squash, kale, collards, potatoes, apples, pears and plums, and -- briefly, two hours at a time --- it gets me out of that chair.

I feel Daughter would approve.

 

 

 

Rinzai was planting pine trees. Obaku asked him, “Why do you plant so many pines in this remote mountain monastery?” Rinzai answered, “Firstly, they provide good scenery around the monastery gate, and then they are for the benefit of those who come after us,” and struck the ground three times with his hoe. Obaku said, “Although this may be so, I’ll still give you thirty blows of my stick to taste.” Again, Rinzai struck the ground three times with his hoe, sighing deeply. Obaku said, “Through you, our school will flourish throughout the world.”