Children in The Garden

Posted by Robert Dailey Aug 16, 2008

I tried to teach my children gardening. I’ve been extremely successful with one. The others have expressed varying degrees of disinterest. My oldest daughter didn’t even like to be outside. Now, she’s itching to get out and have a garden.

My son's tactic was to become "flower blind." I can’t tell you how many amaryllis, herbs and plants have been destroyed by an errant lawn mower (him, not the machine). I asked him to weed once but those “weeds” he pulled were actually fledgling eggplants, beans and cucumbers.

One daughter, when in her teens, actually liked to mow, although I think that the idea of her pushing that lawnmower in shorts, in full view of the boys in the neighborhood had something to do it.

My second youngest daughter thinks that the purpose of outdoors is to provide a place for a bench to chatt with her boyfriend.

My youngest daughter is the gardener. She’s tagged along behind me in the garden since she was old enough to walk. She’s eaten dirt and earthworms, and I let her. She was (and still is) in the garden with me often. When younger she taught me a lot about gardening

Like don’t leave open seed packets lying around. They like to stick those seeds in improbable places. The larger seeds like lima beans are pretty easy to detect protruding from a nostril. Tiny radish seeds are impossible to see. I know it’s totally unrealistic and silly, but I had nightmares about these things.

“Doctor,” I would say (in my dream). “I’m not sure what’s going on but she’s complaining of an earache and I’m noticing little green things sprouting in there.”

And the doctor says “it’ll be okay. Just give her two of these slow-release fertilizer capsules and call me in the morning.”