I guess I should have planted a garden this year. It’s probably a little late now, unless someone could find me some 50-day sweet corn or something. It seems I was busy fishing when I should have been planting, and the time kind of got away from me.

Now I’m paying for it with some imported produce from the grocery store. The grocery has some local produce, but some of their vegetables can’t compare with those a person grows in a home garden. Grocery store potatoes, onions and carrots are fine, but it’s hard to find really fresh sweet corn or snap beans much of the time.

It’s like a friend used to say: “You should have the water boiling before you go out to pick the corn.”

I have plenty of excuses for not planting a garden, but I don’t have any really good ones. I’ve tried the world traveler pretext: “We’re just gone so much, there’s no way I can have a nice garden like I used to.”

And the disease story: “There’s something in my soil that causes the tomatoes to droop over. And I feel sorry for the rutabagas; they look so sad.”

There’s always the plea for more equipment: “If I bought one of those $5,000 tillers, I’ll bet I could grow $30 worth of vegetables every year.”

The truth is, I was fishing. I decided I could grow the vegetables and buy the fish, or I could catch the fish and buy the vegetables. It’s not a hard decision.

There was a time when I thought gardening was a good activity for the kids. I would drag them out to the garden every so often and try to get them to do something.

This was more entertaining for them than for me. They said I looked really funny when the veins stuck out on my neck.
The worst thing about not planting a garden is maintaining an empty garden spot. In the days when we had some sheep, I would turn them out to eat the weeds. I can’t do that any more, thank goodness. The only thing that will make your veins stick out worse than kids is a bunch of sheep.

Anyone who wants to raise sheep to control garden weeds should see their county agent or a psychiatrist. Either one should be able to talk them out of it.

Any number of things can cause a person to quit gardening, but I’ll tell you what happened to me. I was talking with a field man from a farm supply company and asked him how many times I would have to spray my asparagus to keep the beetles under control.

“Well, I’ll tell you what I advise people who want to grow asparagus in their garden,” he said. “I just tell them to go buy a box of asparagus and spend their spare time fishing.”

“What kind of fishing do you have around here?” I asked.

Readers with questions or comments for Roger Pond may write to him in care of this publication.