Wed, Nov 25 2009
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The less you know, the better in gardening ROBERT LEBZELTER column for May 24, 2009 Star BeaconSo a decade later, while searching for house No. 2, our goal was an even bigger yard for a sunny, more vast garden. We ended up with multiple acreage, although with clay soil. Our first year, we chose a low-lying area for our garden. We discovered clay soil holds water, which is why pottery is made from clay. The following year, we chose a higher level of garden, at least land-wise. It only took a decade to learn corn is a bust and green beans are iffy, especially with our rabbit population, but each year we at least try to garden, just as my dad, now 80, still gardens. As a journalist, I am also the Video Viper and don't mind telling you I usually start the planting season with a movie. Just as the local high school football team may watch “Friday Night Lights” or the amateur boxer may take in “Rocky,” I put in my copy of “Jean de Florette.” It's a French film starring Gerard Depardieu as a hunchback city guy who decides to farm in rural France with his wife and daughter. He has ideas. He has enthusiasm. But a resident of the village works to thwart his ambitions to take over his land. Anyway, there are beautiful images of Depardieu's character planting and lovingly watering his little creations. Ultimately, he is doomed to failure. It gives me the kick in the pants to get out and start planting those tomatoes and peppers and green beans, all the time knowing the results will be mediocre at best. All I hope for is a decent crop of cherry tomatoes, which next to a nice, hot radish, is the best food in the world. And cherry tomatoes need to be eaten properly. I get on my tractor to mow and as I pass by the garden on a sunny August day, I swoop down and grab a handful of those sweet tomatoes and pop them in my mouth. Now that's high-style delicacy. Sadly, last year I failed to find anyone who could plow my garden, short of mortgaging the house. But his year, I am in luck and am ready to plant with Memorial Day here and the chance for frost lessens. If we figured all of the costs to gardening, our efforts, like Depardieu's, would be doomed to failure. But like everything else, the journey is everything. And we garden without French subtitles. Lebzelter is special sections editor. E-mail him at bobleb@starbeacon.com. It may be awhile for him to get back to you if he is out in the garden. 
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