I grew up in New Jersey, the Garden State, but as a child knew very little about plants. We had trees I could identify—sycamore and oak and maple—and a Rose-of-Sharon bush grown from a cutting started at my mother’s girlhood home in Virginia. Other than that, though, nothing. I was a girl from the suburbs: Peaches arrived in cans and carrots existed in deli coleslaw.

Tim, on the other hand, spent his formative years on a farm in Texas. His parents grew berries and peas and corn and squash. As a boy, Tim worked alongside his father, watching what his father did and learning from it. Now as an adult, my husband tracks rainfall the way other men follow pro sports. In the ten years we’ve been together, I’ve learned a lot from Tim.  I, too, love to get my hands dirty in good soil. I worry if we plant seedlings too early; I fret about water levels. (more…)

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