The Garden of Small Beginnings, page 9
Angela appeared, with a small boy. It looked as if they were deep in conversation, but as they got closer, I saw it was a monologue.
“And then Orthobot turned into a flamethrower and blew up the skyscraper, but then Dandobot showed up and turned into a crane and rebuilt it really, really fast, but Orthobot tried to kill Dandobot but didn’t because then the evil robot sword monster came and tried to kill them both and they teamed up to beat him, and then they blew him up and it was awesome.” If the kid breathed once in this whole speech, I would’ve been amazed.
Angela caught my eye and smiled briefly. “Wow, Bash, that sounds very exciting.”
“No, Mom, it was awesome.”
And then he looked up and saw us all watching him, and he fell silent and retreated behind his mom. She grinned at us.
“Hey there. This is Bash, my son. Say hi, Bash.”
He mumbled something. Bash. Great. Presumably because he was a destructive force of nature, like most little boys. Not that I’m biased or anything.
“Hi, Bash,” piped up Clare, my little diplomat. “I’m going to grow strawberries in my garden. What are you going to grow?”
He shrugged, still silent.
“What school do you go to, Bash?” asked Frances, gently.
He shrugged.
Just then, Mike trundled up on a mountain bike. He did a daring dirt-track swerve to come to a stop, and the kids all made appropriate oohing sounds.
“Yay, peeps,” he said, which I think is a form of greeting. Or maybe it was, “Yo, peeps.” I don’t remember exactly. The peeps I remember because Clare turned to me immediately and said, “Can I have some Peeps when we get home?” To which I replied that we didn’t have any, on account of it not being Easter, and also on account of Peeps not being an actual food but a by-product of weapons-grade plutonium production. Actually, I just said no, but I thought all the rest of it.
“Splendid, you’re all here.” Edward had come up behind us, and we turned at his voice. He was not alone. Not only was Impossibly Handsome Bob with him, but also a pretty, smiling girl.
“Everyone, this is Lisa Vellinga. She comes from Holland, too, and she’s here to help the kids with their garden.”
“I’m planting strawberries,” someone said firmly.
Lisa smiled. “You must be Clare.” She looked at the other two. “Which makes you Annabel and you Sebastian.”
Oh. Bash, short for Sebastian. Ah.
She reached out, and Clare, of course, took her hand. “Let’s go and see what we need to do to make the earth ready to put your plants in it.” My two headed off dutifully, but Bash hung back. Angie firmly turned him to face her and knelt down.
“Bash, I’m going to be right here. You’ll be able to see me the whole time, and you can get as dirty as you like, OK?” He nodded doubtfully, but walked over to where Lisa and my kids were waiting.
I looked at Angie, who was watching him thoughtfully.
“He’s a little shy?”
She nodded. “He’ll be fine once he settles, but he’s slow to warm up.”
Bash was standing with the others when Clare suddenly touched his arm and smiled. She pointed to something on the ground, and they both knelt down.
“That’s cute,” Angie said. She was wearing her hair more loosely today, probably because having her kid around left her with less time, and in general she seemed softer and happier than the previous week.
“Clare’s very friendly. Her teacher calls her the mayor of kindergarten.”
We had been muttering quietly, but Edward raised his voice.
“Are you two attending? What if you miss something important and all your vegetables die?” His voice was stern, but he was grinning.
“Yeah,” Rachel chimed in, “or worse, some dreadful weed gets started in your crappy plot and then ruins my beautiful Eden.”
Mike laughed. “I was planning on only growing weeds.”
“Weeds or weed?” Frances looked severe in that “I’m a teacher and you’re a naughty kid” way.
“Uh . . . I meant weeds, on account of not really believing that I can grow anything, not to mention that weed is illegal, right?” He was wearing a T-shirt with a picture of bigfoot fighting the yeti, and I was finding it distracting.
“Actually, under state law, you can grow six mature or twelve immature plants, as long as you have a medical marijuana ID card.”
We all pivoted to look at Eloise.
“Or at least that’s what I hear.” She looked at Frances, who raised her eyebrows a little, but said nothing.
Edward coughed. “This is diverting, but let’s stick with vegetables and flowers and herbs. Edible herbs.”
Gene spoke up. “I believe little Clare is planning on growing strawberries.”
I laughed. “You caught that, did you?”
Edward pulled a list from his pocket. “OK, here are the assignments for today. Gene and Mike are together on carrots and cauliflower. Frances and Eloise are going to begin the salad garden. And Lilian, Rachel, and Angela are going to share the work on the other two beds: beans, squash, corn, peppers, peas, and tomatoes.”
He suddenly raised his arms and spun around. “Part of the goal of this course is to teach you to see the natural world that lies underneath the city, to understand how seasons work and how the composition of the earth makes such a difference to how and what you can grow. So many of us have lost touch with the seasons, with the weather, with all the cycles of life that go on around us all the time. You can get fruit year-round, thanks to airplanes, and if you spend all day in an office building, you don’t really notice if it’s cooler outside than it was the week before. And of course, you poor Angelenos only really have one or two seasons, anyway. Hot, less hot. Some rain, no rain. Sad, really. So when you’re digging and planting today, think about how what you’re doing ties you to generations of people who’ve worked this land before you.”
Just as he finished this unexpectedly poetic little speech, Clare burst out laughing. I looked over. The kids were already digging, each of them now sporting large floppy hats, and Clare and Bash were giggling. Rachel had noticed, too.
“Hey . . . I want a hat. And I want to dig, too. Let’s go.”
Edward smiled. “Yes, enough talking. As for the hats, I do have some, but they have a rather large company logo on them, so feel free to get your own. Now, go to your plots and literally stick your hands into them. Break up lumps of mud, examine them closely, and try to get a sense of its consistency. We’re going to start by amending the soil and setting up any trellises or supports our vegetables will need. I’ll come around and talk to each group in turn, OK?”
The kids were chattering happily, and grinned at us as we stood there.
“Sit on the ground, Mom,” said Bash. “It’s warm!” He was beaming.
Angie smiled and sat, looking up at us. “He’s right, it’s very warm.” She stuck her hand in the ground.
Rachel sighed. “OK, dirty-butt time, I guess.” She sat, somewhat gingerly, and after a moment I did, too.
I looked at the others. Eloise and Frances were nearby, and while Frances was already at work, raking the ground and breaking up lumps, Eloise was just kneeling there, her face up to the sun. She looked calm and peaceful. Maybe she was stoned.
Mike and Gene were talking to Edward. Impossibly Handsome Bob came by, pulling a flat cart piled with bamboo stakes.
“Hi, Rachel,” he said, as cool as a cucumber.
“Hi, Bob,” she replied, equally cool.
“I had fun the other night.” Still cool, but his eyes were pretty hot. Angie and I weren’t even pretending not to listen.
“Me, too.” Rachel amped up the heat herself, then pulled a signature move by turning away, reaching up to pull her long hair into a knot, bending her neck gracefully. I’d seen this move work in 97.8 percent of situations in which it was applied. Bob’s eyes narrowed fractionally, and he grinned at Angie and me.
“Delivery, ladies.”
After he’d unloaded his cart next to us, he trundled off, never once addressing Rachel again. It was like watching a nature documentary. I spoke sharply to her.
“Rachel Anderby, when did you go out with Bob?”
“Hey, did I tell you I was going to grow lavender?”
Angie and I looked at each other. She tried.
“Rachel, did you sleep with Bob?”
Rachel suddenly looked up, into the sky. “Is that an eagle?”
We gave up. But we knew.
I bent down to see what treasures Bob had given us. Long bamboo poles and a bale of twine. Maybe we were going to be making kites later. Narrow black pipe with holes in it. It was all somewhat underwhelming, but whatever.
Rachel was chatting to Angela. “So, excuse me for sounding like a dickhead, but do you live in the projects, or whatever they’re called these days?”
Angie nodded. “I live in East L.A., yeah. I’d like to say it has its good side, but it doesn’t. I’m in nursing school at night. I’m going to get out as soon as I can and go live somewhere else, if Bash’s dad will agree to it. Which he probably will. Or someone will shoot him, which will make the argument easier.” She was smiling, joking, but then suddenly she remembered that I was a widow, and she colored.
“Shit, I’m sorry, I totally forgot your husband . . .”
I shrugged. “I forget him, too, sadly. Often for hours at a time I’ll forget he’s dead, and when I remember, it kind of sucks for a bit, and then it’s OK again.”
“How long has it been? Since he died?”
“It will be four years next month.”
Rachel made a face. “Wow, that’s funny. When you asked, in my head I said a year, but it really has been that long.”
Angie looked at her. “You knew him, too, I guess.”
“Sure. They were married for a long time, and we lived in the same city, so I saw them a lot. I miss him, too. He was hilarious.”
Edward walked up. This week, the weather was warmer, so he’d lost the sweater and was just wearing a T-shirt and jeans. He was stronger than I had imagined a professor might be. All the male teachers at art school had been weedy and interesting-looking, with facial hair that made a statement. Edward looked like a firefighter or something, tall and strong and coordinated. Not that I was evaluating him physically, because that would have been demeaning and wrong of me. Edward rubbed his hands together and grinned at us.
“Time to get dirty, ladies.”
We all gazed up at him, and he blushed. “I mean, in the actual dirt.”
He sat down next to us and stuck his hand in the earth.
“OK, so the soil is where all the magic happens, basically.”
I spoke up. “I thought it was sunlight and water that mattered.” (Fifty-seven basic biology textbooks, not to mention Sesame Street et al.)
He nodded, still working the dirt with his strong fingers. “Of course, you can’t grow anything without them, but the soil is where the plants live, where they get their sustenance, and the health of the soil determines how well they do. All the water and sunlight in the world won’t help them if the soil is too tight for their roots to spread out, or too loose and sandy for them to be able to stand upright.”
We all nodded, looking serious and thoughtful. He continued explaining, in his formal way, with the cute accent, and I have to say I’m not sure I absorbed all that much. It was like a chemistry lesson at school. Potassium, nitrogen, something else, I forget, the nature of decomposition and ergo composting, worms were discussed . . . after a few minutes of concentrating, my mind started to wander and I just looked down at the dirt and played with it while his voice rolled over us. Angie and Rachel asked questions, and nobody bugged me. The sun was warm, the kids were engaged, and there was something nice about sitting in the earth, just breaking up lumps. I felt . . . what’s that word . . . happy.
Suddenly Edward stood up again, and so did the others. Shit, I must have missed something.
“Hey, dreamy, time to wield a shovel.” Rachel reached down and pulled me to my feet. “You OK?”
I nodded. “Sorry, I was just mellowing out.”
Impossibly Handsome Bob had shown up again, and it was clear he wasn’t afraid of playing with fire: He had gone back to the basic playbook and taken off his sweatshirt, revealing a tight T-shirt over even tighter abs. Rachel pretended not to notice, but I saw her hand clench involuntarily. Bob was pushing a wheelbarrow full of something dark, which he dumped next to us. It smelled. Or he smelled, but the former was more likely.
“Steer manure,” announced Edward. “You can take it and dig it into your soil. It will add lots of excellent nutrients.”
Bob handed out pitchforks and shovels. Then he trundled off, presumably to get more manure. It was like a Chippendales farming fantasy routine.
I was having trouble with basic instructions. “Dig it in? I hate to ask an obvious question, but what exactly do you mean?”
“I’ll show you.” Edward picked up the shovel, shoveled up some manure, threw it onto the nearest plot of soil, picked up the pitchfork, and started digging and turning over the soil. “Imagine you are a large kitchen mixer, just mix the ingredients together.” He grinned. “Once the earth has been amended, we’re going to lay in some drip irrigation.” He indicated the black pipe. “And then build some supports. One bed is going to contain fava beans, green beans, corn, and squash, and the other will have tomatoes and English peas.”
Well, at least he had ambition. Edward smiled attractively at us all and walked off toward Frances and Eloise. We all watched his butt walk away, and then turned to the task at hand. And it was easy, to start with. But after about five minutes, I started to sweat.
I turned to Rachel.
“Is it me, or is this harder than I thought?”
She leaned on her fork, managing somehow to look like she’d been leaning on pitchforks all her life. All she needed was a gingham shirt and pigtails and she’d be Elly May Clampett.
“I think it must be you, to be honest. In what fantasyland did you think manual labor would be easy? Doesn’t the phrase manual labor kind of give it away? If they called it manual vacation or manual relaxation, then I could see where you might get confused.”
“Manual relaxation sounds like something a hooker would offer,” chimed in Angie, who seemed impervious to effort and was nearly done turning in all her manure.
Fine. I started turning again and tried to pay attention to it as a meditative exercise instead of something that was making my back hurt.
“Mom?” I paused, glad of any distraction, to turn to Clare.
“Yes, honey?”
“I planted my first strawberry. Come see.”
I jammed the fork in the earth and went to look.
Clare was yattering away, as usual.
“So first we stirred in all this yummy poopy stuff for the ground to make it happy, then we carefully made little holes in it with our hands, and then we gently put the little plants in it and tucked them into their beds. It was nice. The teacher is really nice.”
The teacher, Lisa, was right there as she said this, and she smiled. “It is easy to be nice to Clare, I think.” She reached out her hand, mud and all, and I shook it. “Your children are natural gardeners, Mrs. Girvan.”
“Please call me Lili, and I’m happy to hear it, although God knows where they get it from.” I looked down at their little pieces of garden. The earth was all fluffy, and a single strawberry plant was perfectly placed in the middle. Annabel was still working, and hadn’t even looked up at me, which was a good sign she was enjoying herself. She had started with her central heart part and had outlined the shape with smooth pebbles. She was nearly done filling it in with seeds, and I could see a small pile of seed packets next to her.
“How come Annabel has seeds and Clare has plants?”
Lisa smiled. “Because Annabel wanted to plant seeds, and strawberries are best grown from small plants. They will spread out to fill the space over the next few weeks, and if we had planted seeds, we wouldn’t have fruit by the end of it. We still might not, but the gardens will be here for several months, so she will be able to come back and eat the results of her work over the summer. Annabel had the choice of plants, too.” Lisa pointed behind her: A flat of red and blue flowers was sitting a little ways off. “I brought both, because I didn’t know her yet. She was quite clear that she wanted to grow them from seeds, so that’s what she’s doing. Let’s hope they grow and flower in time.”
I went back to my garden. Angie had taken pity on me and was turning in my manure, as hers was already done. I let her carry on, as I believe in honoring the desires of the individual, but I did lean on my pitchfork, helpfully.
• • •
Once our earth was ready, Edward wandered back to talk to us.
I was sitting on the ground, and he looked down and smiled at me. “Are you having fun, Lilian?”
I smiled back. “My back hurts, but apart from that, it’s super.”
He laughed at me. “New things are sometimes painful, no? In this way, gardening is like life.”
I made a face. “But sometimes, pain is your body’s way of telling you to avoid something. Maybe I’m not made for digging.”
Rachel chimed in. “Or maybe you are just being a wuss.”
I looked at Edward. He winked at me. “Let us save the debating for another occasion, no? In this bed, we’re going to plant the classic Three Sisters garden. I assume you know this.”
I started to shake my head, but then it came back to me. “Three Sisters? It’s a Native American thing, right?”
He nodded. “Yes, and it’s a perfect example of companion planting, which is where you choose to grow plants together that somehow help each other to flourish.”
