garden

Independence Day Stories

To help staff celebrate Independence Day this week, the New Yorker is publishing a double issue, the July 8 & 15 2024 issue. I discovered this while I was updating my New Yorker fiction page. The page here is a growing index of the New Yorker short stories published each week. I try to extend the table one week forward and one week back every week. Right now, it goes from 2019-2024.

When I saw that it was a double issue, I was elated briefly, expecting that it would make it an easy two weeks to read all of the stories. Then I looked at the issue’s landing page and found that there are four stories for the issue–the first quadruple story issue in my index.

One of the stories is an unpublished story by E. L. Doctorow. His biographer said that the story “The Drummer Boy on Independence Day” was written in the 1950s but never published. The other three stories are “Kaho” written by Haruki Murakami, “Opening Theory” by Sally Rooney and “The Hadal Zone” by Annie Proulx.

The Hadal Zone is introduced with the blurb “Arwen’s last thought before sleep is that he is in a twisting cyclonic fall down through the ocean trench to become a compressed speck of matter. It feels good.” That’s a curious topic because, coincidentally, Randall Munroe published a video this month “What if you drained the oceans?” answering the question of what would happen if you would put a drain at the bottom of Challenger Deep. Munroe is known for the nerdy xkcd.com and has published several books including a series themed “What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions” that was the inspiration for the video)

brown rabbit photographed in lawn

My “What if” question today is what if I would get a trap and capture the rabbit terrorizing my garden. I’ve got several tomato cages surrounded by fencing devoted to protecting the pepper plants. I planted some zinnia flowers and the rabbit really likes those too. I put a fence around some of them in the hope that a few will recover enough to produce flowers.

It is a pretty bold rabbit. Yesterday I was weeding in the evening, and it came out and watched me. …presumably waiting to find something to eat. I’m more vulnerable to him this year because I have more plants that are rabbit friendly. Peppers are definitely rabbit food. I knew that from last year but was wishful that they would be spared this year. Zinnias are rabbit food and last year’s sunflowers were gone before they got started. I’m glad tomatoes, zucchini and other squash vines are all crossed off in the rabbit diet guide.

I’m glad that I don’t have groundhogs. A cousin who lives in Pennsylvania has a group of groundhogs that have decimated her garden. They have a broader palate than a rabbit. My sister’s garden nemesis is crows which like to play and pull out all of the seedlings. Not to eat them, just to be irritating.

a pepper plant protected by a wire fence

This is one of the plants from a couple weeks ago. I haven’t had any rabbit damage to the peppers now that they’ve got the fence around them. I was concerned that the rabbit might try to dig under the screen, but it’s not that motivated. There are a couple of plants that the rabbit didn’t see because they were hidden in the weeds. Now that they’re more visible, they’re more vulnerable to attack.

The New Yorker is a really solid magazine. I enjoy it every week. One of my projects last year was to make a book containing the comics organized by the artist’s name. It was fun making that. It could be a companion to the book the “New Yorker Encyclopedia of Cartoons”

Some artists are prolific contributors to the New Yorker, adding a comic every two or three issues. There are other artists who only publish one or two comics. It’s been a fun project to learn how to recognize the artists without needing to see the signature. Edward Koren, Roz Chast, William Haefeli, Sarah Akinterinwa, Liana Finck, P.C. Vey, Frank Cotham and Lars Kenseth all have unique styles. There are many other artists with their own characteristic styles that I haven’t listed.

I would like to be skilled enough as an artist to make a mashup of a couple of these artists’ styles (without the cheat of using an A.I. engine to help.)

Overlooking the garden

a few green leaves from a garden

Bang! The window rattled in the kitchen overlooking the garden. The morning sun slanted into the room, lighting up the counter piled with dishes just washed. The knives that she received for Christmas were from the uncle who was distant because he seemed to listen but rarely spoke.

The garden was just starting. She was proud of the even rows that are kept clear of weeds and pests. Somehow, the insects overlooked her garden. Her hatred of poisons and herbicides had been well respected most years.

The window was not normally a target. All spring, the cool breeze that came through it spread the aroma of stew and spices. Past years, the bakery items would be shared with the neighbors. The perfection of the garden’s beauty seemed far from the mess that was her childhood. It was overwhelming and nothing made sense.

Uncle Mark was surely a misfit. No one visited him. I was glad when he gave the gifts last year. He was pulled into the family finally and his reticence to speak was replaced with his chuckling followed by hearty laughter and everyone knew something had changed. At the get-togethers, they always played cards. Oh Heck and Euchre. Uncle Mark had pretty bad luck. The cards ware never what he needed to earn points. He was a good sport and even played to help the kids beat the serious players. It wasn’t so much sacrificing to help the others but rather a streak of mischief-making that had never been evident to anyone.

The knives were still new. their hardwood handles didn’t have much wear. The days of cooking had been slowly fading away. It wasn’t a problem that made her slow down, but rather the old enthusiasm and inventiveness weren’t fun anymore. Perhaps it was time to share the household with another person.

The summer was just beginning, and the harvest was not yet causing the fridge and pantry to overflow. Peas would be the first followed by beans and radishes. The sunny days had been slow to arrive this year. It was time to find something new to do. The days are growing longer, but the time spent alone is more burdensome than before. Life was changing and the future was not so shiny anymore.

… from the red book

Gardening philosophy

My mom suggests that giving garden plants a lot of water in the early summer keep them from developing a sturdy root system and that will hurt the plants later in the year.

My philosophy is that by watering them more, they are strengthened and grow bigger faster so that they are more productive in the harvest season. My plants will be lusher and have more foliage to grow produce with.

The trade-off is that I may need to continue watering more, but the resulting plants will be more robust and more productive

I have experience with that for several years with tomatoes. I go out and water them almost every day unless it had just rained. I joke that I go out to water them when the forecast is uncertain to help make sure it rains.

My tomatoes last year were so much more successful than what other people had reported. That is true again this year. Now my pepper plants are growing strong as well. I have a more and bigger bell peppers than in the past. This year’s jalapenos are also very successful.

While it isn’t proof that watering them is a win, the extra effort stemming from my watering philosophy seems reliable: it yields more produce.

Plant after the risk of frost is gone

This year, that’s dragging on. The forecast still includes frost every few days.

This weekend, I bought some sunflower, zucchini and radish seeds. I was going to buy some cantaloupe, but the package suggested they should be started a few weeks before the last frost which is probably gone.

I’m climbing up the learning curve for gardening.

My big jump this year is to put down some bricks around the garden. Tomorrow, I need to measure things out. I also might make paths through the middle of the garden so that everything is within arm’s reach of a path.

I’m also looking toward buying peas. I’ve never tried growing them before.

At Home Depot it didn’t seem that there was any run on garden seeds. The racks were completely full. However, the store was really busy Saturday afternoon! It was a bright sunny day and people were coming out of their isolation.

I tried to call 811 but my phone said the service wasn’t available to me. I made my mark-up request on the Indiana web site instead.

Sad garden

Plants growing in a garden
I had a nice afternoon yesterday. Mom and Dad came up to help with my garden.

A friend helped expand it the day before. The new part was horrible… about half of it was *full* of rocks. We gave up after I had had carted almost 10 buckets and filled up 4 holes in my driveway. Dad was digging and I was picking up the stones.

There were so many rocks that we had to get more soil. Fortunately, my neighbor was working on her garden and offered some that she didn’t need.

I couldn’t decide what to plant, but we planted zucchini, onions, tomatoes and flowers. I had wanted to plant peppers but the Garden Gate was closed for Memorial Day. I went up today and bought a dozen various pepper plants. I’ll put those in later today after it cools off a little.

What was sad about the event was that mom found a nest of dead baby rabbits in the old garden. We carefully got rid of them, to avoid any possible disease from the remains. There’s been a rabbit in my back yard for years. I’m not sure if the babies belonged to it.

After the garden party, I went to the Y and walked a mile.

Rain, snow, snow, rain

We’ve had a roller coaster of weather the past few days.

Lots of rain and some more snow on the way. Yesterday was in the 60s which a friend commented “in July, this is going to feel cold.”

Some people think that the cycling of the weather can have a lot of subtle effects on mood, joint pain, and other things. I’m not sure.

I’ll be glad when I can plant the garden again. I might make it really big with the intent of donating a lot of food. Last year I was overwhelmed with tomatoes and let a bunch go to waste. If I had realized that I could have donated it to some community organizations, I would have done a better job of keeping up.

Talking the walk

The cliche emphasizes the need to walk the talk. That is, if you declare a path but don’t follow it, you’re just spouting hypocrisy and lies. The converse is talking the walk. This is a different principle, not leading to criticism and judgement, but rather it gives a path for growth and healing. It’s an opportunity for me to be myself, perhaps, to become a better me.

The gist is that while walking outside, I’m not so bound by the synthetic world of men. The static seat in the kitchen or an automobile’s mechanical cockpit get their light from anonymous strangers. By walking, I put my life in front of a different mirror and can see hidden strengths in the reflection.

A friend of mine does counseling with teens. He remarked that with teenage boys, instead of meeting in his office, going on a walk can be a lot more productive. The youths are able to be more direct and make more progress in that less clinical setting.

I’ve noticed a similar effect with myself. When I’m walking with someone, the distraction of my sink of dirty dishes is gone. I’m not avoiding a wreck as traffic merges onto the highway. Instead, I’m sharing an authentic experience with a friend.

Perhaps we’re walking in the park. If we come to a moment and need to contemplate alone, we can take a break and look at a remarkable oak tree and watch the birds fight on the playground. The transition is completely natural. All of that outer beauty won’t hide any inner beauty slowly forming within us together. We’re not trying to entertain each other nor put on the happy face.

When I’m talking the walk with a friend, we explore different parts of our lives. Sometimes I get answers and can solve problems. Of course, life isn’t deathly serious all the time. However, developing a pattern of shared meditation like this in good times can be golden when I don’t know what to ask.

Tomato tango

a photograph of grape tomatoes at varying shades of ripeness
Unripe grape tomatoes
Grape tomatoes among some vines