Drinks on Wheels

Call me water boy.

A colloquial way of describing someone else doing a tough task that others benefit from is to say that person is carrying the water.  On Sunday afternoon, I was that guy.  And, not only did I carry the water, I figured out a pretty clever way to do it.

I was going to visit Jones and Smith (my two gardens) to see if the seeds I’d planted last week would have sprouted by now.  In ideal weather they should have but with seeds planted so early in the season, who knew?  The soil was probably too cool and too dry.  To raise the ground’s temperature I planned to use row covers, sheet plastic mounted on metal hoops.  That part would be easy.  Moisture would be more complicated since the water in both gardens is still turned off for winter.  I had a gallon jug I could fill at home, hardly enough for even the smaller Jones, and it seemed dumb to drive around town with a full bucket of water.  I didn’t want a two or three gallon deluge in the (VW pop-top) van, our home on wheels.

Row Cover? (check), Blue Bucket? (check): Let's Garden in February!

Wait a minute!  Home on wheels?  Home on wheels!  Of course!  The van has a twelve gallon water tank.  I’ll fill it up, then use the shower hose in the back of the van to fill the bucket.  The day was lovely, I’d finished lunch and the Sunday paper, and was excited to get out to the gardens.  It’s a little work getting the hose ready:  drag it to the outside laundry room door, run back through our apartment, across the hall to the laundry room, run in the laundry room, open the outside door, pull in the hose, connect it to the utility sink faucet, then stretch all 100 feet of the heavy thing to the van.  The sweet sound of running water filling the tank was music to my ears.

Odd? What's odd about this scene? Perfectly common, this.

At the gardens, my plan worked like a charm.  I wondered if I looked strange to passersby: a kilted guy (I garden in a khaki kilt) standing behind a van, filling a blue bucket with water from a little hose coming from the vehicle.  I didn’t care.  My water delivery plan was more important than that.  In Jones, nothing was sprouting yet, but that was o.k.  I was ready.  I watered the areas I’d seeded (three buckets), then put up the cover.  In Smith, I was disturbed to see what looked like animal prints in part of the area I had seeded.  I was about to smooth and re-seed it when I saw a miracle: a tiny sprouting seed.  Probably a radish.  It thrilled me.  I watered the area (five buckets), covered it with the row cover, and planted more spinach to make up for what might have gotten ruined by the marauding animal.

The Miracle Sprout - One of several

I spent the next two or twelve or who knows how long hours pulling weeds and preparing the bed.  I love writing butI get lost in gardening.  Back at home, I transplanted seedlings and planted more lettuce and parsley and didn’t finish until dark.  Five hours of garden work exhausted and revived me, made me ready to rest and exult.  And it’s not even March yet!

The Few, The Proud, The Gardeners