Homegrown revolution

My Master Gardener friend Marty (better known as "The Other Martha") sent me this video trailer about a family in the middle of LA that produces 6,000 pounds of food each year on 1/10th of an acre right next to a freeway (I do wonder about the car exhaust issue .... but apparently they are doing just fine). It is inspiring. Makes me think I can do better than one cantaloupe a year.

http://homegrownrevolution.com/trailer

The $600 cantaloupe

There is a book called The $64 Tomato by a writer named William Alexander. I haven’t read it, though reviews claim it is quite witty. I am very happy for Mr. Alexander since he only spent $64 to grow a tomato. I figure the single cantaloupe we retrieved from our garden this year cost about $600.

The Spouse can usually be found in front of the TV, in a movie theatre or behind the pages of a book. But this past spring, he busted his butt to make us a lovely veggie garden consisting of four raised beds (he made the wooden frames himself) bordered with Austin stone “bricks” in a gravel-covered area of our yard. He even had to figure out how to mow down a small hill, build a retaining wall and install a drain to make this work. After hauling in a huge load of expensive dirt (which turned out to have zero nutrients), we planted tomatoes, herbs, flowers, watermelons, cantaloupes and squash.

Thanks to no nutrients, we had leggy plants with no fruit. Forget tomatoes, most herbs, squash and the lettuce (which was planted too late anyway). The eggplants never reared their purple heads, and the tomatillos fizzled instead of sizzled. Somehow the basil survived, and we’ve used it to top a few pizzas. And then there were the cantaloupes.

For some reason we had five lovely cantaloupes that became ripe at different times. Fortunately, we got one off the vine before rats or bunnies actually burrowed giant holes through the remaining fruit. Now we are composting away to build up the lousy soil we bought (although not as lousy as the soil in our yard) and hoping for a slightly more abundant winter garden.

Meanwhile, Mary, my city-dwelling Master Gardener friend, has turned her zero-lot-line yard into a veggie garden and harvests about 100 tons of produce a year. There is something to be said for having a green thumb. Can you order one from Burpee?

Finding my final lifestyle...

After spending years trying on different lifestyles, I have finally found the ideal one here at Pigs Fly Ranch in North Texas. I have been a career woman, a drug store cowboy's wife, an executive's spouse, a social butterfly, a Californian (oh...please...stop), a hostess/party-goer and now a writer/horsewoman/goat owner. This last role is the best.

Here on 4.5 acres of red clay, I enjoy the company of nine pygmy goats, two adorable dogs and a pair of badly behaved cats, plus one husband who is slowly getting used to walking where there is no concrete. I have become a Master Gardener with various raised beds and a beekeeper with two buzzing hives. The Spouse has discovered an interest in native plants, drought-resistant grasses and rain water harvesting. We probably bore some of our friends, but we are more in touch with the environment and with ourselves.

A lot of people dream of escaping the city for the country life, but today’s economy is not making that transition easy. I have carried the country dream with me for decades and only made it a reality in 2007. My advice: hang in there. You can make it happen. And it will be worth the wait.