We've thrown three more tomato plants, all heirlooms, into the planter box. In separate pots, we've added both hot and sweet peppers. I'm not sure how many years we've attempted to grow something edible, but we've yet to taste a bite. Mainly, we've tried tomatoes, but over the summers we've been plagued by fungi, blight, operator error and a two-year old Seth who (we discovered after much bafflement over our uncooperative plants) plucked every newly forming red bud and tossed them.
We have garden visions, with either raised beds cut into our backyard slope or a custom tiered planter attached to our deck. What we've managed is humbler: a small redwood box from Lowe's, two buckets, a bag of soil and much hope. I watch the growth each day, looking for signs of disease or for the groundhog who drops by every so often, sniffing and lurking. I keep the soil moist, and I've sprayed an organic solution a time or two. But let's be honest, I'm at the mercy of forces I neither master nor understand.
We've planted another garden on this same plot of dirt. Miska and I've thrown two boys into the middle of our life. We try to be generous with the love we apply, and we do have our visions of how this family, this future, plays out. But mostly, we're winging it. And watching out the back window, warding off pests best we can. But mainly praying and hoping and watching.
You are so often like rain from God on my life … offering just the right words when I need them. Thank you for this.
I like to be rain. Thank you, Bobby.