Winter 2010

Today is my Mom's 90th birthday!  It is a great celebration for a woman who had quite an eventful life.  She and my father dealt with Hitler's reign of terror during their youth and then after the war became refugees, moving into West Germany, which was under US control.  Both were strong willed, with my father taking the initiative of bringing my mom, my sister and me to the US when he and my mom were 32 years old.  My recollections of vegetable gardening was a small plot of land behind the farm house we lived in during my early years in Germany.  My mom was the custodian of the plot growing all sorts of vegetables.  I still remember being chased by geese and a billy goat as I wandered from row to row in the garden.  I also have very good memories of picking wild blueberries.

It only took my parents three years to buy their first home in the US after coming over in 1953, despite my father making minimum wage of $.75 an hour doing electrical work for a local contractor in Paterson, NJ.  Our first home was on a very small piece of land on a busy street in Clifton, NJ, but the first summer provided an opportunity to create a vegetable garden behind our home.  Our neighbors weren't too impressed when a pile of cow manure graced our driveway (it was fresh and aromatic, to say the least).  They didn't mind, however, later in the year as pounds and pounds of fresh tomatoes and beans were shared with them.  We had a bountiful harvest.  Initially, I didn't much appreciate our garden, as I was chief weed remover.  In fact, I hated that job and often disappeared from duty, finding refuge in the playground across the main road.  I was less reluctant to go out and pick our bounty.

Thus, my interest in gardening developed when I was quite young and has had a long lineage since.  Today, my garden would dwarfs my family's first US garden and is closer to what we had back in Germany.  I am not sure if my skill level will ever approach that of my parents, as their ability to grow food was a necessity, while mine is still relegated to being a most enjoyable hobby.

To commemorate my mom's birthday, I am experimenting with getting some seeds started in our new garden room.  A few weeks ago, I installed a new 6 foot slider in place of two leaky windows and a door.  I had help in putting in the slider, but am working on replacing all the sheetrock, trim and outside shingles.  I am hoping to complete this project in the next week (weather permitting).  My initial planting consists of 4th of July tomatoes and spinach.  I am going to also try and get some lettuce going in the next few days, plus I will start snap dragons.  My wife has already overwintered geraniums and chrysathamums.  Cutting took in about 50% of the geraniums, while the mum cutting were taken too late in the fall.  The mum main plants are doing fairly well.

My attempt at starting tomatoes so early is to see if I can get some production of fruit by June 1.  Last year I had 4th of July and cherry tomatoes by July 5, not too bad for up here in New England, but still not near the goal of June 1.  So, we will see how things go.  I bought a heating mat to help in the germination and with some luck of more sun than clouds, maybe by April I will have some small, healthy tomato plants I can put in a bucket and put outside on warm days.  If the bees come back out at the right time, maybe June 1 would become a realistic goal.