That forgotten gardening plan
It’s the rainy season. I went outside to put the biodegradable waste at the root of the papaya grown in our little soil space. The rotten peelings and dried leaves accumulated there. I have not done any weeding or cleaning outside the house. Only sporadic sweeps from our stick broom would clean the surroundings of our house. It’s still good. At least there are no littered plastics or papers.
Few months ago, I planted, or bought rather, cactus plant and succulent. A pot each. The succulent I came to learn is called ice plant. They are just here at our house, living. But I don’t really do some maintenance on them. I almost always forget about them. Not that it is intentional. It was just not in my system. Not yet, but we’ll eventually do more for our plants.
I didn’t expect my heart to shrink when I saw the root of the cactus not in good condition. I realized we have not put it outside for a long time. I’ve been really busy not to be able to even just allocate a minute of my time tending to it. I am now doing what I can to revive the cactus. It still has the other parts green so perhaps I can do something about it. The succulent is still here, as beautiful as ever. But I noticed that the one grown on the neighbor which they got from here grew more beautiful than ours. I felt some guilt about the plants. I shouldn’t have bought them if I can’t give them enough care.
I am reviving my cactus and hope I will have some success.
I remember before that I had plans playing with the soil. It will calm the mind and refresh my soul. It has that type of therapy when I find the mood to do some gardening. Perhaps one of these days when the season turns dry. Perhaps I will at least remove the weeds and do some layouts.
Perhaps. It is not a promise but something I look forward to doing. When we touch the soil where we came from, we become one with it. This body no doubt will turn back into soil when the time comes. It is not too bad then to be touching the soil once in a while.
I remember before when I still don’t have this hobby of writing that I even love cleaning outside more than fixing the inside of the house. Inside the house it’s a rather complicated affair. Hehehe. Right at the moment, my table’s a mess and I have the glass of my milo still here beside my device.
When I was a child, I had a wonderful experience of growing pineapple. I simply put that part of the pineapple that can grow just outside our house. After some time, it grew! Well, it’s just fascinating to see something grow alive and become many after how many years. I don’t know any more if we still have the pineapple. What our parents usually send us from home are root crops like camote and nuts. They also send banana, papaya, avocado, and star apple. We used to have guyabano in our yard back at the province before but now I think there is no more.
When you successfully uproot the weed with your left hand and you shake it a little to remove the excess soil and you put it in a row to dry, you get the most wonderful feeling. Uproot, shake, set aside to dry. Then you do it repeatedly till all the weed you see, big or small, is put in a row to dry. You then cultivate the soil and play a little with it. You may also use a stick broom to clean remaining uprooted weeds first before cultivating. You then decide you will plant another day.
You take a bath. You sit down somewhere in your house and you see your hands with green substance and you also worry about your pedicure. But that is just some silly part of the game. You watch the yard that you cleaned and you feel happy.
We usually plant onions, garlic, ginger, tomato, and onion leaves. At least on some days, you don’t need to buy such condiments or spices or whatever you call these. Well, we actually have tomato there at our rooftop and sometimes we can just eat them raw.
Perhaps the gardening plan will push through when the dry season comes. By then, we first enjoy the rainy season. This rainy season which makes people nostalgic about a lot of things… Sigh...
