Envy. Yes, it's true. Upon seeing the set up at Kitchen Potager this past summer, I couldn't help but wonder what it would be like to be the caretaker of such a place.
Reality. I stink as a gardener. If it's green, it's gone. Truth is, the only thing I seem to be able to grow is my hair. And so I have mixed emotions when I have experiences such as these were I am forced to accept my failings when it comes to all aspects of gardening.
I couldn't help but think of my grandmother as I walked among the small, thick patches of herbs, vegetables and flowering plants. There were just a few varieties that I could actually identify— and that was only from my sense of smell. So the mint, the basil and the oregano, I had down. Everything else was a green blur. My grandmother came to this country from Czechoslovakia in the early 1920s, found a small patch of land and immediately began to grow the family's sustenance. It was second nature to her and she passed that down to my mom who tried her best to do the same.
I clearly remember scowling when I was asked as a child to go out and pull from the mint and parsley patches in our own backyard so mom could make her amazing soup and garnish her three-layer Jello dessert with small, lush leaves. “Why can't we just get this stuff from the store like everybody else?” I would grumble under my breath. Mom really tried to explain how special it was that we “had our own.” I remember hearing her say, “You just don't know what's good,” many times. Grumble. Grumble.
Oh, if I could only eat those words with a dash of fresh, chopped chives right now. What's worse is my co-workers grow amazing things and make tasty fresh lunch
salads with their tomatoes and homegrown herbs. I buy that über-pricey bunch of basil with its roots in the small block of soil. I have gone so far as to plant this thing only to have it die over and over again. I get a few leaves before it goes for the caprese salads I so love and then I'm back to the store again to buy another bunch.
“Why can't I just grow this stuff in my own backyard like everybody else?” I ask myself now.
Maybe I just don't know what's good.
I plan to find out, though. There will be return trips to the Kitchen Potager and places like it until I can have the use for a real watering can—just like Nanny had.
