Vegetables 2021

On a farm less than ten miles away, where I am fortunate to be offered space, I have a garden in one long row.  It’s a much straighter row this year.  I was subtly provided a string stretched tightly between two stout steel stakes. 

Last year, my first on the farm, I made the mistake of not looking behind me while planting.  My row was shorter and bowed out in both directions, zigging and zagging so much that the farmer who lends me the land couldn’t cultivate next to my row.  I learned not looking back may be a life strategy that has its place, but that place is not found in a garden.

I’ve just caught on, after nearly 70 years, to the important-sounding botanical family names of these familiar plants.  I was slow to learn.  But now that I’m there I’ll throw them in.  Here’s how I filled my straight row, starting from the east. 

Thirteen Brassicas-3 Brussels Sprouts, 4 Dino Kale, 4 Red Russian Kale, 2 Broccoli.

Forty-six Nightshades-not counting potatoes.  First the Peppers:  5 Serrano, 5 Habanero, 2 Cayenne, 2 Jalapeno, 3 Sheepnose Pimiento, 3 Lunchbox, 2 Shishito, and 4 Jimmy Nardello.  26 total.

Next the Tomatoes.  8 San Marzano, 2 Early Girls, 2 Orange Beefsteak, 2 Pink Beefsteaks, 2 Red Beefsteaks, 2 Jet Stars, and 2 tomato cousins, the Tomatillos Verde.  20 in all.

Lots (too many to count) of Amaryllidaceae, the formal name for the onion family.  I planted nearly enough shallot, red, and yellow onion sets to fill out the row.

 The row is capped it off on the West End by a member of the Daisy Family, a single Mexican sunflower, for the sheer hell of it.   

 Earlier in the spring, in a separate communal plot, we planted four rows of potatoes.  Oddly, they’re nightshades like tomatoes and peppers even though they grow underground.  We buried reds, cobblers, fingerlings, and exotic yet controversial purple potatoes under nice black LaSalle County soil.

I love the hidden life of potatoes.  The reveal when you dig them.  That, compounded by the satisfaction of knowing you made them multiply by simply cutting and planting a chunk of raw potato with an eye in it, makes potatoes a simple but wonderful crop.   The cutters, planters, diggers and tenders of those potatoes will dole them out in equal shares when we harvest them at the end of the season. 

At my house in town, I have horseradish, oddly an underground member of the mustard branch of the Brassica family, asparagus from the aptly named and I assume small Asparagaceae family, and rhubarb of the Polygonaceae aka buckwheat tribe.  How buckwheat relates to rhubarb I’ll never know.  All that stuff grows perennially.

I planted cukes and zukes (cucumbers and zucchinis), both from the Cucurbitaceae family, in my previous garden plot by the garage.  My former town garden looks so small compared to the row in the country.  The old garden space is now partially but increasingly shaded by a young volunteer oak tree, likely planted by a squirrel burying an acorn.  I was going to transplant the oak seedling to keep the garden in full sun but waited too long.  Instead, I sacrificed my original small garden plot for what I expect will be a nice big shade tree for someone else.

I also have big pots of herbs off the kitchen with several kinds of Basil-Tulsi, Thai, and Sweet along with Rosemary and German thyme all from the Mint family.  Rounding out the herb pot is Italian flat-leaf Parsley, an Umbellifer.  If I had planted one more particular plant, I would have created within that herb collection the famed quartet of Simon and Garfunkel spices.  But I don’t use sage much, so I left it out.  But you know the tune.  If you don’t watch out it will become your earworm for the rest of the day. 

Are you going to Scarborough Fair?

We also have two big pots of chives, the smallest and skinniest member of the onion branch of the Amaryllidaceae family, which are much more than we need and out of control.  They come back each year no matter how little care we give them.

I was out at the farm last week watering.  Gardening seems so simple at the beginning.  The ground is bare except for the plantings.  The beginnings of weeds may be there, but they are tiny and easily ignored.  At some point, they explode, and weeding becomes frantic.  Unfortunately, when you water your plants, you water the weeds too.

Then comes the staking of the tomatoes.  Pinching off early blossoms and suckers.  Tying vines gently to rigid structure with strips of cloth.  It takes some time.  And despite all our efforts, it is the weather, more than anything we do, that largely determines success.

I’m always relieved when the plants are in the ground.  It is only then that I appreciate each trip to the country.  It gets me out of town, looking at what’s new on the farms I pass, admiring cows still in pastures, and witnessing the explosive growth of Illinois corn and beans in those giant fields.

I swear each year the fields grow larger, farmhouses and barns grow fewer, while the new architectural kings of the Midwest countryside, silver grain bins with propane tanks and steel sided pole barns for massive machinery, multiply like rabbits.  There are fewer animals and people out there all the time.  It’s beginning to look like an ag factory on a grand scale, complete with all the charm factories exude.

But I just tend to my row.  I swear that country garden kept me alive and sane during the pandemic.  I think I’ll always remember realizing (or did I know all along?) that life goes on no matter how dire threats become to us humans.  I was standing next to the pepper plants one day when it hit me.  The sun was where it should be.  The sky was just as big.  The breeze blew the same as always and the plants were not fazed.

Plants are so much simpler and more focused than humans.  They stay put and live out their purpose without a lot of screwing around.  Their purpose is simply to grow and reproduce.  Thank God for plants to hang on to when everything else seems to collapse around us. 

I’ll let you know how the garden turns out.  Maybe I can explain how those vegetables taste.  We’ll see.