Ah, to this day I still remember my first gardening experience.
It was such a disaster that I didn’t think I would ever want to
garden again. I almost decided to turn my casual hobby into the
most rage-inducing topic
you could possibly bring up to me.
It all started a few weeks after I moved in to my first house. I
was excited just to have my own grass to mow, since I had been
in apartments and condos for quite a while. In between plans to
paint walls and renovate
the inside to exactly how I like, I thought it would be a good
idea to start a fruit garden so that I could have some fresh
produce and put my yard to use. At that point I didn’t really
know anything at all about gardening. But still in my spunky
youthful years, I decided I didn’t need help. How hard could it
be to start a garden and grow stuff? After all, it happens in
nature all the time and nobody even has to do anything.
I already had a grassless patch in my yard where it looked like
the previous owner had attempted a garden. But any attempt they
had made turned out to be an utter travesty. The area was full
of rocks and weeds, with no signs of any agreeable plants. I
spent several hours of work spread over several days to clear
out the entire area, leaving nothing but dirt. At that point,
however, I didn’t realize the difference between “dirt” and
“soil”. I was dealing with barren, hard, nutritionless, and
unforgiving land.
I made some attempt at making my garden look nice; although I
think even Martha Stewart would have had difficulties. I took
some stained boards that were sitting in my basement (quite
convenient, no?) and used them as
a border for my garden, to keep out all the pests that couldn’t
jump more than a foot (I figured I would be safe from lawn
gnomes). I used the pile of rocks I had collected from the
garden to make a creepy shrine looking
thing in front of it. I don’t know what I was thinking when I
did that.
I went to the store that very day, and picked out whatever
looked tasty. Strawberries? Sure! Watermelon? Yeah! I hacked
away a hole in the rock-hard ground and poked the seed in. After
that, I think I watered it
faithfully every day for several weeks before realizing that it
was not going to grow anything. But even after I had that
realization, I continued to water in hopes that my seeds would
pull a last minute sprout on me. But
I knew there was no hope, and I was heartbroken. After all those
hours of pulling up weeds and tossing rocks into a pile, I had
no fruit to show for my labor.
So, feeling dejected and betrayed, I logged onto the internet
and searched for a guide to gardening. I quickly ran across a
site that led me to realize the true skill required for
gardening. It was then I learned about soil consistency,
nutrients, ideal watering conditions, seasons, and all those
things. After I read up on my area and how to grow fruits, I
learned exactly what to do. I learned how to get the ideal soil,
when to plant the seeds, how much to water, etc. Just a night of
browsing the internet and printing off sources, and I was
totally ready for the next planting season.
If you’re in the position I was, and you’re just itching to
start a new garden… I urge you to learn from my mistake. Make
sure you do plenty of proper research on the types of plants
you’re trying to grow, along with
the climate. Spend money on good soil, good fertilizer, and good
garden tools. Hopefully you don’t have to go through the
emotional disaster that I went through.
