A diversion from the terribleness of everything for a tragicomic tale about my attempt at gardening.

I’ve been a single father most of my son’s life.

When he was five, I got the bright idea that we should start a garden together.

1/

As a suburban kid he didn’t know what it was like to get his hands dirty, dig in the earth, grow his own food, pick fresh vegetables, etc.

“It’ll be fun and educational!” I thought.

2/

So I found an organic community farm a bit of a hike from our home.

It was a drive but being out in “the country” was part of the allure.

It looked and felt more like farming than windowbox gardening.

Rented a plot and just like that we were men of the land.

3/

Our little 200-square foot spot looked a tad less than fertile. Save for the two woody blueberry bushes, it was a barren place.

But, hey, it was *our* garden.

It will be easy and it will be great!

4/

Now, at this point, I should probably mention that I have a well documented history of being dramatically wrong about how easy and/or great my ideas are.

That has led to many a spectacular folly.

(this is foreshadowing)

5/

So, anyway, my 5-year old and I had a lease on some of God’s good earth!

It was a rocky place but it was a blank canvas.

And I threw seeds at it like Jackson Pollock.

We shall grow all of the things!

6/

I planted that bad boy to the gills.

“Soon, we will be awash in nature’s bounty!” I said.

Poor word choice there with the “awash” bit because the Lord then said unto me “Remember that Noah guy? He built that boat after what I did to his garden. p.s. here’s some rain. LOL.”

7/

Biblical. Days. Weeks.

And that was when I came to learn that my plot had two undisclosed features:

1) It turned into the Rio Grande during even a sunshower

2) It had about an inch of soil sitting atop an impenetrable blacktop of clay

There were no survivors that sad May.

8/

So, I’m about $100 invested at this point and sitting on a rental swimming pool.

Nature was mocking me. And I will not be mocked.

So, I went down to my workshop and formulated a counter-offensive.

After all, has man not tamed even rougher terrain?

9/

“Eureka! I shall harness the wisdom of Asia and terrace the earth!”

So, I carted my ass off to Home Depot, purchased a large quantity of lumber and a very loud saw.

Cut and lugged the wood. Got the last of the terraces in when I saw... a tag stapled to the end of one piece.

The wood was pressure-treated.

Which was against garden rules.

So I had to take it all out.

And find a lumber yard.

I just wanted to grow some tomatoes, man.

Now I’m using power saws and talking to lumberpeople.

11/

But, lo, I tamed that watery bastard.

Hauled in 2,000 pounds of soil one 40-pound bag at a time.

Terraced and put in drainage.

And then my son and I hit do-over and planted stuff again.

12/

Meanwhile, up in the North 40, as I called the top of our plot, our two blueberry bushes were looking like quitters.

My son was 5. Blueberry failure would not go over well at all.

No, that would not do.

13/

So I read and researched.

There was a classic pH-balance problem. Alkaline soil. That’s when the soil is too alkaliney. Fixed that one.

And I needed a net to keep out the birds.

And they needed to be watered more often.

14/

Not being one to miss the opportunity to over-complicate something, I naturally passed on just getting a net and watering them more.

No, I had to “invent something” despite being bad at that.

Behold the Aquatron 3000!

15/

Looks like a plain ol’ blueberry cage but those pipes hold a stealthy 60-gallons of water for drip irrigation.

The garden police HATED it.

The clipboard-toting nags tried to make me take it down for being... three inches too tall on one side.

I had to *file an appeal*.

16/

But the Aquatron 3000 prevailed.

And that’s when it all got good.

All that work. All those drives - some with my son, many without - to haul and build and plant and weed.

That’s when it all got good.

17/

We grew a little of a lot.

Carrots, tomatoes, peas, lettuce, cucumbers, peppers, beans, squash, cantaloupes,

We grew strawberries, herbs, and flowers.

Everything grew...

18/

...especially our blueberries.

We named the two bushes McGwire and Sosa because they were flat-out juiced on organic love and care.

25 pints off of two bushes.

19/

The first thing we picked though... the thing that sprung up and survived when everything in our plot failed...

...was rhubarb.

In those over-promising first few months the only thing we got to pick was rhubarb.

20/

I knew nothing about rhubarb.

But I found a recipe and we made a pie.

Raspberry-rhubarb.

It is a pie unlike any you’ll find on a menu. Tart and bracing. It has a zing. It’s an icebox pie to serve cold on a hot day.

It isn’t a kids’ pie.

21/

But my son loved it. And so did I.

And every year since, we make a raspberry-rhubarb pie.

It’s an accidental tradition.

A legacy of way back when I was barely post-divorce and he was little and we had a garden that almost failed but we saw through.

22/

We made this year’s edition yesterday.

Baked together with the radio on. Me cutting and chopping. Him, almost a teenager, mixing and cooking.

23/

Man, that garden was a lot of work.

I used to drive out at night when I didn’t have my son to weed and water and pick by headlamp.

Now though, it’s just stories and memories and a tradition.

Yesterday was raspberry-rhubarb day.

Tastes just as good as that first year.

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