Retirement Means There Is So Much to Do

Semi-retirement has many pitfalls. You never know what is going to pop up next. All kinds of things are popping up or into my mind. I don’t understand that. It’s almost like I’m collecting hobbies. First I decided to make my own jewelry. Now I have a whole jewelry store. Then I decided I MUST crochet, mainly because all my grandkids decided to have kids of their own. I’ve got one whole living room chair full of crochet projects in progress. Hey, I did finish one baby blanket. The rest are still in the works. Then I decided to fix up the back porch for entertaining. There for a couple months all I did was buy outdoor furniture, on sale of course. Never pay full price. And the back porch does look pretty cool. That’s where I also took up my next hobby, bird watching. And then there’s my newest nemesis – the garden.  The gardening obsession, oops, I mean hobby, came out of nowhere. In the past I’ve tried a few planting projects. Two pecan trees died. The rose bush Son bought for Mother’s Day, and which he planted himself just in case, died under my watch. And then there’s the peach tree which keeps on blooming, but has not yet produced one eatable peach! What was I thinking?!? I tried that upside down tomato bag, but my one tomato came out of the bag, took a right turn, and tried to grow up toward the sun. Isn’t that what they are supposed to do? Never got one tomato out of that bag.

Just this summer I decided I must have a garden, and I will concoct a garden to be fun for the arriving great-grandkids. Uh-huh. You know, Mom and Dad had huge gardens, most of which I never set foot in. They were green-thumbers deluxe. They could grow anything. Not me. Did not get any of that green-thumbness in my genes. Nevertheless, I’m gonna do this. So, I picked a spot, and announced to Darling Daughter I was gonna grow a garden. Darling Daughter got the green-thumb gene. So she just raised her eyebrows and shrugged. “Uh-huh.” Not to be dissuaded, I dug a hole around a post in the backyard, and dropped in some marigolds. I know from experience that marigolds are hard to kill. That teeny little flowerbed turned out just fine. ‘Hey,’ I thought. ‘This is fun. I’m gonna keep going.’

So I moved on to a bigger project, a much bigger project. It’s about 50 by 10 feet. And I descended upon the flower and vegetable nurseries, both in the real world and on the Internet. My goodness, there is so much on the Internet. There’s Homes and Gardens and there’s all those shop-by-internet nurseries and there’s so much information I was overwhelmed. I am also obsessed. And sometimes, it ALL GOES ON SALE. Do I ever pass up a sale? Nope. At one such in-this-world sale I bought a whole pickup truck full of flowers. Then thought I better count all those plants. Uh, try over 100. I still don’t have them all in the ground, but I’m working on it. According to the experts, I must now “amend” the soil in my selected garden spot. But I ran out of dirt. I had to go buy dirt. It’s a good thing dirt is cheap, and sometimes on sale. I need a lot of dirt for the 50 by 10 foot flower bed. Two hundred pounds of dirt later, it finally dawned on me that a good garden needs lots and lots of dirt. And you know, this gardening thing is turning out pretty good. I’ve only killed a couple plants. Nobody told me I had to water those plants daily during Oklahoma’s hot summers. On the other hand, I only killed six mum plants. Did I know they don’t like that much water? No! I drowned by fall mums. Oh well, maybe some will go on sale soon.

Then there’s the tomatoes. I wanted yellow tomatoes. I just wanted one, but it turned out all the local plant sellers only sold tomatoes in six packs. OK. Got it. Now I have tall tomato plants tied to every one of my back porch roof posts. But, do I have any tomatoes. Uh, no. Tomato plants are growing so sky high it now looks like a jungle on my back porch. But there are no tomatoes. One day I sat and studied those plants, and I noticed something. There were no bees pollinating the tomato flowers. Oh. I guess that is important. When I mentioned same to Darling Daughter and Son, they said the lack of bees was impacting other gardens. Then Darling Daughter mentioned bee keeping, like it might be something I could take on as a hobby. Ha, ha, ha. That was me laughing out loud. So, for three years I have tried planting tomatoes. At least 14 tomato plants have been planted in various situations, some upside down, in my yard. And there are no tomatoes. But wait! What is that hanging off the one tomato plant that was planted by Darling Daughter? Oh my! I have a tomato. That makes the score three years, 14 tomato plants, and one tomato. Success at last.

On the Labor Day holiday I asked myself what I would rather do. Should I do what must be done, like cleaning house, laundry, dishes, etc., and should I do what I wanted to do. . .work in my tiny garden. Yep. I worked in my tiny garden, and loved every minute of it. Some of those plants are still alive, and I am happy and successful in my semi-retirement.