The Coolest Boss Ever

The husband’s four employees—all young guys in their early 20s—adore him. One of them told me the other day that the husband is “the coolest boss ever.” If I were going to get on my soapbox and rant, I would deliver a sermon about how we have failed the young men of this country by removing any sense of purpose and direction in their lives. I won’t, because I want to talk about my garden, but I will say that I am proud of the husband’s willingness to teach these kids some marketable skills. I watched them one day when they were here working. At the end of the day, they all gathered around while the husband told them what they would be doing the following day, and then each of them shook his hand and said, “See you tomorrow, sir.”

[I get called Ma’am, too, which I think is hilarious, but what was even more hilarious was the day I showed up at the jobsite and one of them yelled over to the husband, “Sir! HR is here!” They know who signs their paychecks.]

The husband spent the day helping me with the garden yesterday. It rained, but we worked out there anyway. I took two showers and changed my clothes three times over the course of the day. I said to him that the weather reminded me of all the times I went on spring camping/field trips with the girls when they were in elementary school. We tromped through miles of woods in drenching downpours over the course of those years.

When the husband gets into work mode, he barks orders. Sometimes I have to remind him that he is not the boss and I am not an employee. We do a lot of negotiating, LOL.

We started out by planting the rest of the strawberry bed. I moved the bed to a spot between the raspberries and the lavender hedge, so now all the berries are in the same part of the garden. I have three 30’ rows of strawberries planted on black plastic. I have mixed feelings about black plastic, but it does cut down on the weeding, and the weeds here are relentless. The strawberries I planted a few weeks ago look great, and now the whole bed is in.

Once that was done, he got out the rototiller and tilled up the section where the strawberries used to be. That area has been sitting under a billboard tarp for the past two years. I would like to make that into a new herb garden. He brought home a pallet of landscape edging from the auction in April and thought I could use it out there, although we had to have a discussion about our differing visions for how that would happen. We laid out the landscape fabric and then he moved the rock over there.

[We also have different ideas about the meaning of the phrase “to garden.” I am not sure he understands the concept of puttering. Gardening, to him, is making a list of all the things that need to be done and attacking them with a vengeance. I had to remind him that the herb garden was not going to get planted yesterday; the herb garden is a season-long project that will evolve as it goes along.]

We came in and ate lunch. I got 20 minutes to inhale my meal, which is 10 minutes more than he usually gives his employees, but as he pointed out, “We’re not out there to have a picnic.”

We saw a mama deer and a tiny, tiny little fawn yesterday. I’ve never seen a fawn that small. It looked to be just a day or two old.

After lunch, we mulched the potatoes with what was left of a round bale of straw that’s been sitting at the edge of the garden for a couple of years. It’s nice and rotted and makes fabulous cover to control weeds, and at the end of the season, it adds to the organic matter. The last time we had potatoes in this spot, we had a bumper crop. He hauled the straw over with the wheelbarrow and I crawled around and spread it out in the rows and between the plants.

By the time we finished, it was 3 o’clock and I was hashed. I went in for my second shower and third change of clothes.

I am so pleased with how the garden looks. We haven’t had a June this wet for several years. I’d still like to get beans in, but the ones in the greenhouse are taking their sweet time germinating—it’s just too cold and we won’t heat the greenhouse for two trays of beans—but I hesitate to put seeds in the ground because I think they might rot. Despite the cool weather, the tomatoes look fabulous. They do like the black plastic. Some animal got a few of my cucumber and melon plants and I may have to replant those. The two peach trees we planted at the beginning of April look great. The grapes are leafing out. The currant bushes are loaded. We’ll have a ton of lettuce, Swiss chard, and collard greens.

Every year is different. We’ll have food from the garden, just maybe not the same food we had last year.

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I am teaching a serger apron class tomorrow at the quilt store north of town. The Renee pants class is on the schedule for August 5 at the other quilt store, and the Serger 101 class is on the schedule for August 13 in Spokane. My cousin’s daughter and her husband are coming for a visit at the end of August. Another cousin is getting married in Seattle in September and the Szabo side of the family will be there for that. This year will be over before we know it.