Gardening in the Rain

Mom gave me over a hundred flower bulbs. It was time to replace her tulips, so of course she ordered enough bulbs to populate the Netherlands. My mother is a generous person. She felt I needed about a hundred of them.

Thanks, Mom.

So, there I was with a big crate of every kind of bulb I ever wanted to plant and no time to do it. My plan was to have them in the ground by mid-October. Ah, the best laid plans of mice and men . . .

October came and went. As from my former post, you remember what happens when you wait too late in the state of Illinois to do an outdoor project. I still have frostbite on my ass from that one.

The problem was more than time. The summer had been hot and dry, and the ground had been baked to a brick-like consistency. So, I needed to wait for a little rain.

A little rain.

It was too cold the day I cleaned the flue on the roof. It was too cold and icy to do much at all. I needed to wait. Hey, the weather man said it would warm up. He also said it would rain almost non-stop.

Like without stopping.

But Mom had given me a crate of expensive bulbs. Before the bulbs could go in, I had to take out the tomato beds. The wood was rotting. The beds were full of fungus from the wet spring, the kind that infests tomato plants and makes them die. So no tomatoes could be planted there again. So they had to come out.

When I put them in a few years back, I put in a potent mix of well over 2000 lbs of organic materials to grow my lovely veggies. Each year before planting, I mixed in another 250-500 lbs. I figured, after some run-off and whatnot, there was probably still 2500 lbs of soil to move. Removing the rotting wood took little effort. One sharp whack with a hammer and the wood falls away.

Yesterday dawned drearily, but the rain had stopped. It wasn’t a heavy rain all week. It was a drippy, drizzly rain that soaked into the bones, but not the kind that fully saturates the ground. It does, however, soften it enough to actually drive a spade into it without killing oneself.

So, yesterday I started. I knocked down one box, carted the soil away—a wheelbarrow at a time—and worked the area, put in 28 bulbs in the cold wind and quit. It was too chilly, too windy to carry on.

Which meant my extra day off was going to be hell. I needed to cart off another 1500 lbs of dirt, break down the box, put in two more tulip beds and a bed of annis, various hyacinth, daffodils and whatever else was in the crate.

Then get Christmas lights down from the attic, string them up, put up the deer and other display lights. So much for reading that book I have sitting on the table. Sigh.

The wheelbarrow is rickety. It’s only 30 years old. The ground is wet. No, it’s a slog of mud. The grass is wetter. The mud is slick. The shovelfuls are heavy.

I was on my fourth load in the wheelbarrow. I was moving the soil to various low spots—anywhere where I could get rid of it. That’s a lot of dirt to dispose of, but I was determined.

My muscles screamed, still sore from the day before. My back was telling me no more. My boots were soaked through and heavy with thick globs of mud and wet leaves. It was like carrying around 10 lbs of cement on my feet, and my feet were freezing.

The fourth load was especially heavy. For some reason, I failed to remember how rickety the wheelbarrow was. So, I was moving the load, moving fast because it was heavy.

The handle snapped off at the base. It sheered away under a couple hundred pounds of muddy garden mix. The other handle was intact, so the barrel immediately listed sideways, causing me to over-correct, which caused the barrel to drop to the ground at a dead stop.

I failed to stop. I failed to stop when my pelvic bone came into contact with the lip of the barrel. I failed to stop when I went down into the mud in the bowl. Ah, I just love the flavor of organic, composted shit in the morning.

So, wiped the mud from my face, spit out a mouthful of sphagnum and manure laced with vermiculite, and crippled the barrel over to my next dump spot.

Time for a break.

I hate my neighbor. He said, “Hey, why didn’t you come get me? I would have used my in-loader to move all that for you.

Yeah, I hate him and his kind offer. I guess my deer-in-the-headlights look with black mud streaking my face and hair, not to mention the copious amounts coating my clothes and boots, must have been comical. He launched into a belly laugh that would make Merry Ol’ St. Nick envious.

“Too late?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

I was done moving dirt, so it was time to plant. Bulb diggers are fabulous tools. I highly recommend them to anyone who wants to plant bulbs. You plunge them into the soil, twist, pull, and you have a perfect hole.

I recommend you spend more than a two dollars like I did. On my second row of bulbs, the digger split down the middle, flew apart and sent me face first into the freshly turned mud.

Yummy.

This time, it went up my nose. Not to worry. I always carry tissues when digging in the mud on cold, rainy days.

Yes, it started raining again. Lovely. Four tissues later, I pieced the cheap POS back together and went back to planting. The dog was howling. She hates rain. She wanted in the house, her little body shivering while her cute button eyes looked at me with an expression pure hatred. On my feet again, over to the door, let the dog in.

I noticed every time I knelt and climbed back up; it was becoming more difficult. Each movement elicited old lady grunts from my throat; each reach, a groan.

I sneezed out another load of mud.

When the large tulip bed was finally finished, the neighbor yelled over to ask if I wanted him to send over his boys to help. These are great boys. They are everything true boys should be, but I couldn’t stand the thought of mud balls decorating my siding, so I declined.

On to the next flower bed. It was on the south side of the house, so I figured I would catch less of the breeze. I was soaked to the skin, my hair clinging to my muddy face and neck. It kept getting into my eyes, so I brushed it back with muddy gloves.

Oh, hell. Who cares at this point?

The drizzle stopped. For like a minute. Then it rained. It really rained. Like a downpour. I didn’t care. It didn’t matter. Nothing was going to stop me from planting all those daffodils, tulips, annis, crocuses and hyacinths. I shall be victorious!

The neighbor on the south side pulled in. Upon seeing the broken wheelbarrow lying on its side like a beached whale, he offered me his. His response was my turning my mud-covered face in his general direction and offering him a sneer.

I can still hear him laughing. He started laughing as he walked away. He laughed as he entered his garage and closed the door. He was still laughing so loudly when he entered his house that I could hear him in my yard. He’s still chuckling. I hear it now.

Finally, with all the daffodils, hyacinth and crocuses in, it was time to move to the big garden in the front yard. I’d dumped a lot of dirt there. So, off I trudged with my crate of bulbs, my mud-caked cell phone, and equally muddy mini-speaker, and headed that way. On the wet, muddy oak leaves scattered over the wet, muddy grass. I’m not sure I even managed to find all the bulbs that flew through the air with the greatest of ease when my feet took wing and escaped from gravity. The back of my head landed in the freshly turned mud, causing four bulbs to squeeze out of the ground like toothpaste from a tube.

Come to think of it, that might be why the neighbor is still laughing.

Anyway, I hauled my wet, muddy ass up, picked up the crate, hurled into the driveway with all my failing strength, threw the spade like a javelin, embedding it in the ground more than 40 feet away, kicked the crippled wheelbarrow, possibly broke a toe and set a new record in colorful curses that ranged in the realm of multilingual. My Cherokee grandmother would be so mortified.

With renewed hatred for the task I had taken on, like a woman possessed, I dug what I could find of the numerous bulbs from the wet grass and leaves, marched to the last of the flowerbeds, dug so hard mud was slung into the street and shoved those accursed bulbs into place. I was done.

I also managed to get one lighted decoration from the attic when I discovered I could no longer climb the ladder or pull any heavy boxes down. It was all I had to give. I was so far past done.

Now there’s a trail of mud—and a little blood—blazed through the house, and the water heater is out of hot water, I feel like I was trampled by a herd of moose. It’s not an ache, exactly. It’s more like a burning, blazing fire through every fiber of muscles in my body. My joints won’t bend properly, and there’s a distinct possibly I may have cracked my coccyx.

Those blessed flowers had better be worth it, and spring had better bring plenty of colors.

Christmas ADHD

It was a rough Christmas. To be honest, the entire holiday season has been a whirlwind of furious activity. When September arrived, I finally started feeling better. After one week shy of a year from the time my heart went haywire, I was finally starting to feel like my old self.

My old self took a look around and discovered my home was a mess. I spent several weeks scrubbing, cleaning, spackling, painting and barking orders at the rest of the household. New furniture was ordered and the place reorganized just in time to feed the multitudes for Thanksgiving. It took a week to prepare the food that would be devoured in less than two hours.

The next day I rested. Then it was time to prepare for Christmas. The days flew; the husband injured his shoulder at work. He needed care. He needed meds. He needed a doctor but convincing him of such is like trying to pull teeth on a tyrannosaur. We argued. I threw up my arms in surrender and tried to carry on.

The project this year was bath stuff—you know, soaps, oils, gels, salts, powders—all the stuff needed to enjoy a decadent bath, complete with chocolate truffles. What’s a luxurious bath without amazing chocolates? All of it had to be formulated, made by a caring hand for the women in the family. I turned my dining room into a laboratory.

Men don’t really care about luxuriating in a hot bath with fragrant salts and oils. For them it would be baked goods. The kitchen was turned into a bakery. I had to spend hours creating goodies and slapping the husband’s good hand every time he tried to sneak a treat.

Treats are a favorite of most men. They wander through life looking for some tasty confection to shove into their mouths. Grandma always said, “The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.” I think some women should aim their culinary weapon more carefully. Some of them tend to cook for the wrong men and end up with broken hearts and fatherless children.

Oh, yeah—the child. In the midst of flurry and mayhem, the princess fell ill. She came back from the annual cookie baking at Grandma’s with a stuffed head and a slight fever. On Monday, I left work early to take her to the doctor. The poor kid had a sinus infection—or so they thought.

Missing time at work, behind on the gift projects and still trying to find time to do the shopping, Christmas was just a week away. The work week ended, the child was not improving. I was in the final push when she began crying in the night. Fortunately, I was still up furiously working away at getting things finished. At this point, I was no longer looking at the calendar, but at the clock.

The husband was pressed into taking her to urgent care. They sat there for three hours while the smoke hissed from my furious hands. The oven fired non-stop, with the aromas of various cookies mixing with the scents of lilacs, lavender, jasmine, oranges and cloves.

The salts spilled all over the floor.

I love my floor, durable hardwood that shines as highly polished wood should. I believe I wrote about the odyssey of having it installed. Home repairs always come with their own special problems. No matter how well you plan, how organized you are, something always goes wrong.

I have yet to paint the kitchen and dining room. Kitchens need fresh paint regularly, at least in homes where kitchens are used. I cook. I cook a lot. My walls are a mess. I really must get them done. Maybe I should paint them green. Green is a nice color for kitchens.

Where was I? The phone rang and the husband informed me the princess had strep. She was indeed very ill. That’s just fabulous. As I contemplated this new development, I set my bare foot in the spilled bath salts. Oh, yeah. Clean up the salts.

The timer went off and I couldn’t remember why I’d set it. Was there something in the oven? Butter cookies.

My husband loves butter cookies. He’d eat his weight in them every day, if I could bake that much. I would have to hide them if I wanted any left for Christmas presents. I had yet to wrap things and the daughter would be home soon.

So, I wrapped. Still working furiously, I had paper and ribbons strung across the living room floor. When she got home, she found a pile of packages covered in pretty paper. I told her she could decorate them with all the ribbons and trinkets from the wrapping box and turned her loose.

The husband returned to town to fetch meds and toilet paper. Antibiotics have an adverse effect on the digestive tract. I also asked him to get yogurt. It’s essential while taking antibiotics.

The day ended, the child tucked in and the next day was a mess. Not a surface in the main part of the house was clear. There were still cookies to bake, soaps to make, gifts to finish and a kid who was up in the night with an ear ache.

Ear pain is the worst. The poor kid has dealt with this since she was three months old. There is nothing more crazed in the world than a mother with a sick kid. When she’s in pain, I’d kill to have her healthy again.

Another dose of meds and a glance at the abandoned vacuum cleaner and I tried to remember what I was doing. The husband complained of throat pain. I demanded he see a doctor immediately. He told me to . . . Never mind.

Focus. Christmas gifts. Cookies? Tinsel is shiny.

The day sped by. It was a day when I cursed the Mayans. If the end of their calendar had meant the end of the world at midnight on the 21st, I wouldn’t be struggling to finish crap up. The Mayans were an interesting people. So much technology, so much violence. I wonder what they would think of our modern Christmas rituals.

The cookies are burning. I don’t even remember putting then in the oven.

There was a loud crash at the back of the house. I didn’t bother to find out what it was. It didn’t matter. I still had to clean up bath salts.

Cookie sheets loaded with balls of raw dough were shoved in the oven. Melted soap had to be poured into molds.

The kid was screaming again. The pain was unbearable. Her regular doctor could get her in right away. Get dressed. Now!

The strep was drug resistant. They put her on something stronger and recommended complete bed rest. Well, duh. It was Christmas Eve and Christmas with the family was just canceled. While driving to the pharmacy, I made all the calls needed to inform family, blew up at my sister who didn’t want to help get the gifts to my mother’s—after all the hard work—and got the kid home. The concern now was her infected eardrum rupturing. It did, later that night. It’s the first time it’s ever happened.

Christmas Eve. I’m in a panic. There are things to finish. My brother-in-law generously offered to pick up the gifts for my mother’s party. I suspect it was because I blew up at my sister, then called my mother to tell her I would bring the things myself , then my mother probably called my sister to tell her to cooperate and now the entire family is angry at me. I don’t care at this point. I’m still walking in spilled bath salts. I grabbed a broom.

The broom lay forgotten on the floor while I boxed, bagged, wrapped and tagged. It was all done when the man arrived. He didn’t look very happy. I’m sorry for that. Truly I am, but I shoved the thought to the side while tending the child’s pain. I put a pot of soup on, tripped over the broom and skinned a toe on the bath salts.

The husband announced he was hungry. The kid wanted to unwrap gifts. The sausage we were supposed to share with the in-laws for Christmas Eve dinner needed to be cooked. Forgetting completely about the soup, I started a loaf of bread to go with the spaghetti I was now planning.

The lights on the tree are pretty. It would be nice if I could enjoy it. I sat down to gaze at it. The kid announced she was hungry. I had to feed her because she was losing weight from lack of appetite. I just put a tray in her lap when the husband returned with some of her favorite soup from her favorite restaurant. Excellent timing.

I was done. Finally. After stubbing my toe on the broom in a pile of bath salts, I cursed and began packing all my supplies. The husband complained about the mess on the floor, but didn’t bother to help clean it up. Instead, he made a bee line for the piles of cookies I’d failed to hide.

The sun was shining on the melting ice outside the window. Shiny. The cat ran through the room and skidded on the salts. I finally remembered to clean them up, finished packing the supplies, put the centerpiece in place and headed for the living room.

“Can we unwrap presents yet?”

The child was finished with her lunch, patiently holding the tray with its uneaten remnants of food. Dropping a handful of tissue paper, I took the tray and tried to find a clear surface in the kitchen to set it on. It was a mess. The cat found something to bat across the floor and right underfoot. The dog chased after the cat. I tripped and knocked over a jar of bath salts.

To occupy the kid, I let her open a gift. It was a sketch kit, complete with everything a sickly child needed to occupy her hands. She was overjoyed.

I stepped in bath salts while carrying empty tea things to the kitchen and went in search of the broom. I found something that needed to be wrapped and went back to the piles of crap in the living room. Ribbons and bows and tape and paper—all over the floor. Decorating gifts is a creative talent of mine. I enjoy it. I don’t use those cheap ribbons available only at holiday time. I go to fabric stores and buy the good stuff. I use lace and ornaments and candy canes.

The husband growled about gritty salt under his feet.

I abandoned the living room mess and went in search of the broom. The kid wanted water.

The sausage was burning.

The dog was chasing the cat.

The stockings were hung with great care.

The last batch of cookies were disappearing down my husband’s gullet.

I forgot what I was going to write about. Christmas rituals? Insanity. Ooo, that golden ornament is shiny. Nice.