Karpa, my wife, has a saying that she frequently repeats. “Truly, I can grow anything. Truly.”
And I have a common response, which is, “Yes, that includes growing truth from a bed of lies.” For her recollection is that our magnificent garden is in large part due to her metaphysical qualities which, through some elan vital, is channelled through her corpus, and then beamed out through her green thumb and divinely into our yard. Yet my recollection is that the garden is at least partly a result of my labour, planning and good sense, as well as partly an obsequious component to my good nature.
To say that I had no interest in gardening is an understatement. The fact is, I don’t particularly like being at home. But to our great fortune, and at the bank’s incredible gamble, we were recently successful in obtaining a garden’s the prerequisites: these being mainly a mortgage, house and plot of dirt for which we will forever pay taxes. Gardening then became an unintended consequence, mostly due to the unrelenting force of nature here in Tasmania, where everything grows disproportionately despite one’s efforts. We therefore became gardeners on account of location rather than by any willful planning.
I tried to deny the fact that we were gardeners. I looked the other way. But before long, the stuff that is there just grows. Ah, nature, glorious nature. Then the stuff that has grown previously also sprouts new stuff that grows. Wait, slow down nature. Try as I might to deny the profligate vegetation, the exponential growth of the greenery means that the stuff that grew from the original growth quickly grows further in a wild frenzy, like the curly and untamed hair of a madwoman. If one wishes to avoid attention, as is my nature, then, well, there is only so much denial one can muster before the fear and judgement of the neighbours outweighs the original gains one received from garden denialism. So we became gardeners, based on location and time, much to my dismay.
My first lawnmower was a second-hand purchase from facebook. Old mate started it up for me on day one, and we smilingly parted. He was so much the happier for obtaining my one hundred fifty dollars; and I was all the happier for having paid him for the privilege of cutting my own grass. As a raging capitalist, it felt odd to pay someone else for the privilege of my having to cut my own grass. Did he perhaps want to do it? No luck! He did not see that as part of the deal and quickly left my premises.
With no other options, I began to manage the wheelie machine, maneuvering it through our rocky soil. It growled an angry growl, but proceeded to work well enough for the remainder of the afternoon. But it then showed its true, lazy nature, and avoided starting ever again, much to the frustration of my shoulder’s now worn-out rotator cuff, and much to my chagrin as worn-out and defeated capitalist. Thanks to the Launceston Rubbish collection service, we were able to dispose of the wasteful, gas-guzzling mower one year later, following its long, dormant slumber in our shed. It never even paid rent.
The old lawnmower hibernated in my shed next to my second lawnmower, which was a tiny, excitingly lime-green electric machine, newly purchased from the chain of stores here called Bunnings. The nice thing about this mower is that it is compact, electric and efficient. The lime green colour reminded me of a mis-happened repainting of our childhood station wagon, which was painted a similar, unique and particularly attention-drawing hue of lime green. It did the job alright; that is to be sure. But, it also drew unwanted attention. “Oh, look. It’s the Bulman’s.” The same attention now focused upon our new mower on Saturdays. Having to mow the overgrowth with a bright green mower drew questions and curious eyes from neighbours, who pejoratively described our green machine as “cute.”
To my dismay, I found myself repeating out loud, if only to myself, words my father used to say. “It gets the job done, doesn’t it!”
After taming the lawn, my wife decided she wanted to plant a series of trees in our yard. She went to an orchard with a friend one afternoon, only to return and instigate the most bizarre and confusing of conversations.
“I think we should plant some trees.”
“OK. Good idea. What type of trees?”
“These are special trees. I went to a dwarf-orchard today. I bought some dwarf-trees from the nursery.”
“Ohhhh-Kayyyyy.” The word dwarf-orchard immediately stopped me in my tracks of mowing the lawn and speaking harshly to myself, so that I might now speak harshly to her, instead. Momentarily, my attention wandered to absurd, cartoonish places which exist only in my head. Pictures, mostly composed of Lord of the Rings characters, overwhelmed me. As I mentioned, I am no gardener. My instincts when it comes to what is common in a garden are fairly under-developed. As the imagery of sugar-plumb dwarves danced through my head, I left the conversation free to breathe a bit. I asked open ended questions.
“Can you tell me more?” is what I said.
“We now have a dwarf-lemon tree, dwarf-plumb tree and dwarf-apple tree.”
Along with not being a gardener, I’m also not a moral philosopher or ethicist. But despite these lacunas to my personality, I still like to know what the hell I’m growing in my own backyard. Lemons? Plums? Apples? Dwarves? Because if it is the latter, dwarves, I have to object at once. And sternly so. Not on moral or ethical bounds. Hardly at all. I am left with no choice but to object with the timeless cliche, “Honey, what will the neighbors think?” Growing little fruit is innocent enough. But growing little men with mountainous noses and oversized ears? I can’t participate in something like that. Would we have to feed them? What would they eat? And what to do when they eventually reached maturation and puberty? No, no, no. I couldn’t bear the thought. I’ll not participate in a dystopian future as such.
After further explanation, my wife clarified the genetic marvels of modern gardening and science. I was relieved on two fronts. The truth of the matter was despite their misleading name, neither that these trees were tended to by dwarves at an orchard, nor did these trees produce dwarves from their branches. These trees themselves were but a tiny tree, with disproportionally sized fruit, like the appendages of a human with achondroplasia. So one way of looking at it is that our tree would have large hands and feet, except instead of hands and feet, there would be fruit we could pluck for tea, pies and juice. How marvellous she made it sound! And talk of efficiency! My goodness. What a return on the investment. We could have so many dwarf-trees, with freakishly sized fruit, in such a small space! Why, we very well could have our own miniature dwarf-orchard.
I was immediately won over by my wife’s explanation, if only for a minute. This sudden revelation produced the seeds of elation, joy and humour in me, and simultaneously sprouted a simple request from my wife. For I was now commanded to dig holes for the godforsaken, freakish, and tiny things.
“Will it be a dwarf-sized hole?” I wondered.
Not at all. The tiny dwarf-trees required regular sized holes, and a regular sized effort, which produced a fully-grown, man-sized backache. For, similar to the unexpected and disproportional strength one might find when wrestling a human dwarf, these trees bore an uncanny resemblance when being manhandled. For they were much more difficult to manoeuvre from the car, carry, and plant. Once again, I had to reflect upon my underestimation, my capitalistic mis-judgement, and my acceptance of proposition from someone besides myself: What my wife branded efficient was what a lunatic brands a perpetual motion machine. It’s simply not possible. Efficient for exactly whose effort?
We then set to plotting out patches for pumpkins, raspberries, strawberries, tomatoes and potatoes. Our son distributed seeds, and, while we were intentionally ignoring him, he seemed to repay our neglect with poetic justice. He scattered our seeds everywhere and refused to tell us where as if it were a game of hide and seek.
The only thing we could be sure of was our potato seedlings, which consisted of unused potatoes who tried to plant themselves underneath our kitchen cupboards. Oh, trust me, I could go on about potatoes. For this is potato country. And if there is one thing I am capable of, it is this: as much as my wife can grow beauty and truth from our plot of dirt, I am capable of growing vegetation from trash. Perhaps it’s because I’m Irish. The rooting tubers remained unscattered by our neglected son, and I was able to plant them in systematic rows composed of compost and manure. We ended up with delicious, giant-sized potatoes, which I promptly wrapped and presented to our neighbours this Christmas.
“I grew them myself,” I said. The sheer look of delight and surprise upon our neighbors’ faces…Who wouldn’t like to receive a hearty, full-sized potato as a present?
And we all had a chuckle at their response, “Well, that’s a first time!”
They are very lucky we moved next door, to be sure.
But I could go on ad nausea about our adventures in potatoes. I won’t. Not now. But if I had to…I surely could.
We also grew giant, human-sized sunflowers, and patches of pumpkins in the most unexpected places. I’ve had to hack at trees and bushes to keep them at bay. Everything is half-finished and our gardening to-do-list continues to grow. There is corn with ears, and strawberries and raspberries with snails. We’ve tangled everything up with nets to keep the animals away. And, truth be told, the nets are there, partly, just in case the trees do grow dwarves.
So this is to say, there is much to be learned from tending to a garden. I highly recommend it. And, as a capitalist, I should also offer you the opportunity, should you wish to experience the glorious wonders of nature, that is…but there is an opportunity to tend to our garden yourself. For only a small fee, of course. Please do say the word.
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