Comments on: A little spot enclosed by grace

By: BruceC

BruceC — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 18:14:07 +0000

#19 It’s “OK” cause the vegetables aren’t in a real army and don’t subscribe to the Geneva Convention anyway. The real torture is reserved for the vegetative combatants: Weeds!!

By: Bob

Bob — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 17:59:01 +0000

#18: But how do you wash off soil from your vegetables without using a water board?

By: Researcher

Researcher — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:30:32 +0000

#15 I think that putting Solanum lycopersicum in the ground on Easter Sunday in our hardiness zone would be a violation of the Geneva Convention. (See Article 51.)

By: Cynthia L.

Cynthia L. — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:03:46 +0000

And that is why I love SoCal. I can drool and get some very unrighteous coveting of your lovely large spaces. But I put my tomatoes in the ground in March, and the first one was ripe first week of June. Actually, although I get very early harvests, I don’t tend to get a very large yield. Morning coastal fog keeps them cooler than tomatoes would prefer to be. It’s a rough life, but somebody has to do it. :-)

By: kris

kris — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:47:53 +0000

Jealous of all of you in more hopsitable climates. Tomatoes didn’t go in here until the first week of June.

Norbert, thank you for the quote and accompanying story.

Tracy M. yes. We are just about to start our 11th year at our school.

By: Bob

Bob — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:42:39 +0000

#11: I always plant my tomatoes on Easter Sunday. It seems to give them an extra edge. Try it.

By: Norbert

Norbert — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:09:17 +0000

I really like this. Although our garden is currently limited to about two dozen pots scattered around the flat and the balcony, the beauty and satisfaction of the harvest are the same.

My grandmother had a handpainted sign in her garden that said,

Cela est bien dit, mais il faut cultiver notre jardin.

When I asked her about it, she showed me her copy of Voltaire’s Candide, and explained that the line was the main character’s response to all the foolishness and wickedness of the world: “Excellently observed, but let us cultivate our garden.” As I teach the book these days, I always picture her garden, and the other gardens I’ve loved, as an antidote to all the aggravation and nonsense of the novel and by extension the world.

By: SLO Sapo

SLO Sapo — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:03:46 +0000

Since we planted vegetables this year for the first time in a decade, this really resonated with me. Thanks.

By: Tracy M

Tracy M — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 14:54:13 +0000

Kris, are you a Waldorf family?

By: Researcher

Researcher — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 14:35:35 +0000

Nice post, Kris.

Our tomatoes are “ripe with promise” and little else this year. Forget ripe tomatoes for the Fourth of July. We’ll be lucky to have ripe tomatoes for Labor Day.

This is the first year we planted tomatoes here, so we thought it was something we were doing wrong, but the newspaper this morning reported that due to a peculiar combination of weather, this is the latest tomato crop in over half a century.

Every gardener learns the law of the harvest, but every gardener also learns that sometimes the harvest is an uncontrollable surprise.

We belonged to a lovely CSA in San Diego (Be Wise Ranch, so no one has to ask [although it's full with no applications being taken and it looks like a high demand may be driving prices up a little]) but here we only have access to one CSA and it is full with a full waiting list. I keep trying to convince one of the local farmers to open a CSA, but so far no luck.

(Belonging to a CSA allows you to live the Jeffersonian agricultural model by proxy.)