Every spring brings new lessons in the garden, and sometimes I feel like an old dog who's a slow learner. The impulse to shout DUH is strong, but here goes:
1. When you buy bags of mulch and someone is loading it into the car, you won't know if the bag weighs not 42 lbs. as it's supposed to, but a metric ton. This is because it's been stored outside and got wet. When you get this load home, believe me, you'll develop a hernia trying to get it out of the trunk and where it needs to be. Make sure you get DRY mulch. Ever so much easier.
2. Surgical gloves are a great help for weeding. I went to a hardware store and asked if they had them and the sales guy looked at me funny. "I'm not going to murder anyone," I joked. He just stood there wondering. I bought a box and am tearing through it. Actually, the gloves tear but not right away and because you've bought a box, you have lots more. These are especially helpful when putting down (dry) mulch. Your nice gloves won't get wrecked and you have greater dexterity.
3. Clean up after yourself when you're finished working in the garden, even if you're dead tired. This is sort of like doing the dishes before you go to bed. Nothing more depressing than coming downstairs in the morning to a kitchen full of junk. Last night I forced myself to bag up the weeds, put the tools and wheel barrow away and sweep, sweep, sweep. Even in its weed-filled state, my garden looked sharp this morning and I felt very virtuous.
4. After you've cleaned up the garden, clean yourself up. Don't pad around the house in your muddy clothes. Again, despite your fatigue, you'll be glad you did this. Put fresh clothes on and pour yourself a glass of wine. Feel civilized again. Then take a stroll around the raised beds and pat yourself on the back for being such a hard worker.
5. Tackle one problem area at a time. If you're like me, you're working on one corner of the garden and find yourself moving toward other spots, sometimes in the far reaches. This is bee behavior. Since we're not out there to pollinate, makes more sense to stay in one spot, get the job done, then move on. The results will be more gratifying this way.
6. Don't kill yourself. I'm on my 15th life, having overdone it many times. Lately, because I have to work for my living, I've been doing about two hours a night. It's actually good that it gets dark at that point. Gives me an excuse to stop. You can do more on weekends but during the week, I find two hours is the tipping point. Any more and I'm yawning (more than usual) at my desk the next day.
7. Take a night off. Tonight, for example, I will admire my week's handiwork but refrain from doing any more mulch. Tonight I'll take it easy. Who am I kidding? Tonight I have laundry to do and cooking and all the other stuff I neglected.
8. And while I'm doing all this, my garden is coming alive, which is the whole point. Last night as I wandered around out there, I discovered that my Clematis Montana rubens, after two years of frustrating me and barely hanging on to life, is in bloom. This has got to be the most delicious clematis - three-inch blushing pink blossoms that resemble the wild anemone you find in the woods around here, cascades of them with a thick vanilla scent.
I know the catalogues use all sorts of words to describe a flower's fragrance - spicy, citrusy, etc. - and I had my doubts about this one being like vanilla. But it's true. True and totally divine.
