Monday, July 6, 2009



I've been wanting to plant my own garden this spring. Never got around to it....there are so many wonderful, fresh, fertile farms in my area of New England. There's a farmer's market every few miles and a Saturday market just a five minute walk from my house.

Growing up in Pennsylvania, my parents cultivated an enormous garden, ripe with twelve rows of corn, potatoes, lettuce, cucumbers, squash, and tomatoes. The kids (Joe, Denise, Jim, and I) would spend early mornings weeding. I hated the spiders, hidden, embedded in the corn stalks just waiting for a finger. I loved the dew strung along the webs like a glass beaded necklace. There were slugs, Japanese beetles, ladybugs, and rabbits who took advantage of twilight to feast on the backyard bounty.

There has never been a taste sensation to rival that of a fresh plucked, warmed by the sun plump tomato, with just a sprinkle of salt. Backyard dinners were complete with sweet corn freshly picked and husked by little hands minutes earlier, green salads loaded with radishes and beets, cabbage and carrot slaw with the kick of vinegar and mayonnaise.

So many of my summer childhood memories are rooted in that family garden. Next spring I hope to grow a garden and hope my children will help me weed and plant, and pick. If the season is good, we'll grow lots of memories too!

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