I haven’t planted an actual garden since my 4-H days. It’s not because I don’t like vegetables; it’s because I don’t like work. But this year, I got ambitious and planted a handful of radish seeds in a couple of giant pots on my deck. And yes, I realize that, by most people’s standards, a handful of radish seeds doesn’t qualify as “ambitious.”
But honestly, if I were to put a real garden in my yard, I may as well put a neon sign beside it: “Deer Buffet! Open 24 hours.” The deer spend more time in my yard than I do. I see them out there, chomping on my grass, watching me out of the corners of their eyes. I’ll bet they’re thinking, “Too bad she’s not a gardener. This would taste really good with some fresh scallions and a little arugula.”
We’ve even had bucks lounging under our deck on hot days, but to my knowledge, none of them has ever ventured up the stairs. So I can’t blame them that I’ve had no radishes worth eating out of my little garden. And I haven’t, though the deer might disagree. What I have had are some really large tops on some very tiny bulbs. My radishes look like little weightlifters wearing red Speedos.
According to my good friend Google, there are three possible explanations for my radishes being all talk and no action: Too much shade, seeding too thickly, or too much nitrogen in our soil. Shade is not a problem where I have my radishes. Nitrogen may or may not be, though if there’s too much nitrogen in my soil, I don’t know how it got there, so I’m hard-pressed to get it out.
It is possible that I planted my radishes too thickly, though. Radish seeds are tiny. It’s easy to get carried away when you’re dreaming of bowls of sliced radishes sprinkled with salt. And I do dream of that. Some people fantasize about travel to exotic locations. Some people fantasize about George Clooney. I fantasize about veggies fresh from the garden—and eating them in exotic locations with George Clooney.
And it’s hard for me to thin plants once they’ve sprung up. It pains me to pluck out of the ground something that I have, against all odds, managed to grow. It’s like laying off good people when I’m the one who hired too many. It’s not their fault! And it seems so wasteful. Now that I think about it, letting fifty radish plants die from overcrowding might be a little wasteful, too.
Whatever the reason, I have yet to eat a radish out of my deck garden and I’m not optimistic that I will. Maybe if I had faith the size of a radish seed, I would have radishes. But alas, I do not.
That’s where you come in. It pays to have friends in the great garden of life. I love gardeners—not gardening—but gardeners. Gardeners have no qualms about thinning. And they think big. All the gardeners I know have more veggies than they can eat, can, or leave to rot on the vine in good conscience.
Meanwhile I am the Statue of Liberty for produce. Give me your lettuce, your peppers, your huddled masses of tomatoes yearning to be salsa, the refuse of your teeming garden. Send me these, your homeless veggies. I will make a salad! And if you know George Clooney, send me him, too.
