Lexington Interfaith Garden

by Janet Kern

Carla and her team!

It was a beautiful fall morning on the Saturday of Columbus Day weekend. By 9:00,  the only clue that it was no longer summer was the lack of summer harvest vegetables for the food pantry. No more beans,  or eggplant… and only a few tomatoes. And the late lettuce had been eaten by the bunnies. But there were sugar pumpkins and kale,  and we harvested the last of the chard. Basil and parsley were abundant too! After sending off the food to the food pantry,  we drained and rolled up the hose from inside the garden, and then spread manure on the asparagus and rhubarb. Remaining work days in the garden will include taking down the wood fence around the big garden,  with a plan for a bunny-proof fence next year…

Pumpkins and Pilgrims on the way to the food pantry

Pumpkins and Pilgrims,  some might find that to be an unusual combination,  but not at the interfaith garden. We had the pleasure of having a few members of the Pilgrim Congregational high school youth group arrive at 8 AM to help out in the garden this Saturday. It takes something special to get high school students out of bed early on a gray Saturday morning.

They harvested basil,  parsley,  eggplant,  tomatoes,  cherry tomatoes,  swiss chard and kale. They fed the chickens the cherry tomatoes that didn’t make the cut. All told we were able to deliver 33 pounds of produce including a couple dozen eggs produced by Carla’s chickens.

Pilgrim youth group members

We didn’t have any broccoli this morning –  the bunnies got into the garden and ate them all the previous night. Carla had been protecting 6 plants for this harvest,  but somehow those pesky rabbits got past three layers of fence before we arrived.

One thing that didn’t go to the food pantry was this huge mushroom growing on one of Carla’s tree stumps. One of the gardeners claimed this variety of mushroom is edible…  no one wanted to give it a try –  not even the bunnies.

Edible? Mushroom growing near the garden

‘It will bring people together,’  he said. And he was right.

DRIVING HOME from Boston on the afternoon of May 5,  Ron and Cindy didn’t talk much. There wasn’t much to say. A team of doctors had just told them that Ron’s esophageal cancer –  diagnosed only days before –  was inoperable. No cure. No hope of long-term survival. With radiation and chemo,  Ron might have nine months to a year.

They’d been together since high school. He was only 60. They’d been looking forward to retirement,  maybe to traveling a little,  to the birth of their second grandchild. Now suddenly they were figuring out what they wanted to do over the next nine months to a year. “I’d like to have a garden,’’ Ron said.

Cindy was surprised –  he’d never grown anything,  never expressed the slightest interest in gardening. “That would be nice,’’ she said vaguely,  imagining a couple of tomato plants.

Four days later,  she came home from work to find the yard filled with men,  boards,  dirt,  a Bobcat,  and a 20-by-30-foot raised garden. Ron,  who had recently marked his 29th year of sobriety,  had mentioned at an AA meeting that he wanted a garden,  and his friends had showed up to build him one.

He was sitting in a chair,  watching,  talking,  laughing. There was no last-wish solemnity about the scene;  Cindy was struck by how happy and relaxed they all seemed. Ron tried to pay for the materials;  the guys wouldn’t let him. Cindy kept thanking them,  telling them how amazing they were. When they left,  she turned to Ron. “Have we met? You don’t garden. I don’t garden. This thing is gigantic –  what the hell are we going to do with it?’’

“I think it will bring people together,’’ he said.
Over the next days he was able to sit by the garden sometimes,  but soon pain and exhaustion kept him in bed. “Nine months is optimistic,’’ the radiologist said.

Friends stopped by;  they didn’t want to tire Ron,  or tax Cindy too much by asking for details of how he was –  it was clear how he was –  so they worked in the garden. They planted seeds and seedlings. Cindy’s brother installed a sprinkler system. Neighbors planted corn. Ron and Cindy’s 8-year-old grandson made a path,  using leftover flagstones he found lying around the yard. Visitors came,  didn’t know what to say,  and weeded.

Ron died on June 7. After the funeral people went back to the house and wandered out to look at the garden. Ron and Cindy’s grandson ran around handing out radishes,  strawberries,  and lettuce leaves. Men in suits were hoeing,  staking tomato plants.

All summer,  the garden became a quiet focus for people who’d known Ron. It produced like crazy:  beans,  cucumbers,  peppers,  squash,  okra,  beets,  basil,  and more tomatoes than anyone knew what to do with. People who otherwise might have been too shy to visit were comfortable dropping by to weed and water and harvest,  and they ended up talking,  telling Cindy funny stories,  or stories of how Ron had helped them. They stood out in the dirt and cried. Ron had been right that the garden would bring people together. It couldn’t cure anything or heal the loss or soften grief and loneliness,  but it gave everyone something to do.

After 39 years of marriage,  Cindy knew Ron very well,  but he was always capable of surprising her. Once,  fishing for him to say something romantic,  she’d asked what he thought it took to have a good marriage. There was a silence. Then he said,  “I think both people have to be willing to ignore a lot of things’’ –  but he said it gently,  thoughtfully. It startled her and made her laugh;  and she realized he was right. His wish for this garden,  she thought,  came from that same mysterious place:  something unexpected that actually went straight to what mattered.

She was careful,  picking vegetables over the summer,  not to romanticize the garden too much,  not to turn him into Saint Ron,  but at the same time to appreciate his clarity,  to let herself feel how deeply she had been cared for and was still cared for.

“I don’t want this to become a memorial garden after I’m gone,’’ Ron had told her. “Just enjoy it. Have an eggplant on me.’’

Joan Wickersham’s column appears regularly in the Globe. Her website is joanwickersham.com.

80 pounds of produce headed to the pantry

We’ve delivered 790 pounds of produce to the food pantry so far this year and 80 pounds today! We had a bumper crop of Pumpkins,  Butternut Squash,  Kale,  Lettuce,  Swiss Chard,  Cucumbers,  Yellow Squash,  Eggplant,  Tomatoes and Cherry Tomatoes.

Growing Buckwheat over the potato beds

Carla is planting cover crops of buckwheat over the old potato beds. Some of the buckwheat is already flowering and Carla hopes it will help the bees lay in honey for the winter.

by Amy Swanson

Fall Produce on the way to the pantry

Did you know that garlic buds and their cloves are actually the seed of the plant? So if you want to plant garlic,  take that bud off your counter,  split it into the individual cloves and plant. That is what we did this morning. Turned over one of the beds from a previous crop that was done and planted garlic. But here’s what I don’t know because I forgot to ask…  is the newly planted garlic for next spring,  or is it one of the cool-weather,  quickly regenerating crops that can be harvested later this fall?

With freeze warnings out,  we were sent on a mission to scour the tomato plants. Pick all that were ripening…  if it were blush colored or ½ red,  pick. The rest of the maturing will happen on the counter,  and it won’t take all that long. Lots and lots and lots of cherry tomatoes. The chickens think we are the best. Why? Because they get all the tomato rejects!

The garden keeps on giving! Guess what beds are still producing… tho not at the pace of their “high season” ? Strawberries and asparagus. Yes,  imagine my surprise when we were sent to weed the asparagus bed and found new spears. In total,  we had about 5 or 6 spears to cut. The asparagus and strawberry beds will be getting an early feed of composted manure.

How many Interfaith Gardeners does it take to pick cucumbers? Apparently 4 and 3 different attempts. Cucumbers do a very good job of hiding under the leaves. First Carla went out to pick. So cucumbers went off the list of assigned chores. But the tomato pickers passed by the bed and found a few. Then Carla went back and found yet another great cucumber that all of us had missed. “You” can hide but eventually “you” will be found!

As it turned out,  it was all Hancock volunteers this morning. As we worked together, catching up with some after a summer away,  I was reminded about this whole other aspect of the garden—how pleasant it is to work alongside someone and shoot the breeze.