DAY: Garden, anyone?

By RAY DAY
Tribune columnist

April 26, 2008 12:38 am

— Anyone who knows me well, will say that I look forward to putting out a garden each spring. To me that is the goodbye to winter and hello spring.
It also is the time when we get some hard rains and always the chance of that last hard freeze that every year tries to hold us up another few days before getting out there in Gods gift to us and use it for some goodies that only come from doing it yourself, and come harvest time, start filling up the freezers with the ones we can’t eat fast enough.
Getting out there in the garden also gives me that one place where there is just God and me and we do a lot of talking with each other. You don’t hear Him speaking but you feel the wind blowing and the birds singing through him. And the feeling you get when you know he has answered you is one of refreshing and soul filling, that can only be gotten when you have felt the heart of God next to yours.
This year might be the last one I plant because of my health but I won’t know that until that time when the winter winds start to go away and the urge to once again start planning for one more year of gardening. I take it “one garden at a time”.
As the month of April came into focus, and the arrival of my onion plants from the state of Washington, that urge got bigger and as soon as the ground was dry enough, I put out over a thousand onion plants and then the rains came and that stopped me until once again as soon as it was dry enough, I put out a thousand more.
Then I can wait until the first week in May to start putting out tomato plants and pepper plants. Maybe some cucumber plants along the fence, and maybe some green beans in whatever space is left.
People have told me that I put out too much but when you enjoy something like I do about planting my garden, it really isn’t.
My freezer will be filled once more for the winter and we will have all those goodies to digest all winter. Have you ever eaten a lettuce, tomato, and onion sandwich with salad dressing on the bread?
You ask where the meat is and I will tell you that meat is not needed as this sandwich will give you all you want and not put on those pounds.
Every year I find some story to tell about what has happened while I am out in the garden.
One year I came face to face with a pit bull looking the size of a horse and while keeping a cool head, I eased out of the garden, back into my fenced yard and then hightailed it to the back porch.
One year I decided to work my garden while it was muddy and I fell face first down into the mud and I had to crawl out because I couldn’t get up.
One year I went out into the garden at the far end and a big rain suddenly came forth and I couldn’t hardly see where to walk and I fell over the fence and rolled into the drainage ditch.
Man, do I have fun each year out there where I have both my peaceful times and some rough ones. But that garden is my own space and I love it. It is a place where I find peace with all things and the therapy is good for me.
So it is not just the food I grow that keeps me doing it each year. It is the peace I find out there with a one on one meeting with my Creator, and as long as he allows me to do so, I will be doing it each year.
To see the growth of a new life coming from a small seed that is part of the never ending cycle of life, I feel so good. If you have the space, try it this year and have fun.
Ray “Uncle Ray” Day of Kokomo is a weekly contributor to the Kokomo Tribune. He can be reached by e-mail at uncleray@skyenet.net.

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