The Garden

A few nights ago I made dinner.

I'll wait while you pick yourself up off the floor.

Are you back? Recovered? Good.

I grilled some pork chops and, of course, they needed some veggies to go with them. What better than a medley of carrots, yukon gold potatoes, and sugar snap peas? I did have carrots in my fridge but no peas or yukon golds. What to do. I went out to my garden and dug up some new yukon gold potatoes, had my son--who's still young enough to get excited about the garden--pull up some carrots, and I pulled off as many peas as I could find. Wow. I can't believe my garden is actually producing something besides weeds. Soon I will have tons of ripe tomatoes. YUM! But unfortunately, my basil and cilantro have gone to seed. I'll have to see if I can salvage some for canning salsa and with my tomatoes.

The funny thing is that last year I spent at least a half hour - but usually closer to an hour - every day working (and I mean physical labor) in my garden with the puniest of results. My jalapeno (pictured here on the right-most edge) is producing prolifically this year. Last year, I went nine months with beautiful blossoms but no fruit. Talk about frustrating. After that, I swore off gardening. Again. So why didn't I stick to it? You'll have to check back later, 'cause that's a different story for another post.

If you've read much of my blog, you know I like to relate my little life lessons to my writing. So, here's my analysis: sometimes we work and work at something and it just doesn't come together for a long time; other times, we work and work at it and beautiful, wonderful fruit is born. So, no matter where you are in this journey, keep working, keep learning, and keep writing.

Write On my friends.