By age 38, I had eight kids. As dearly as I loved them, I wanted a quiet place to go to. When my youngest was two years old, I decided to build a garden. I found a good spot with great sun exposure beside the long looping driveway. South of the space I had chosen cedars had grown tall but nothing stood in the way of the sun to the east or west.
This garden would be my quiet place, but my children would help me to build it. I employed my oldest sons to retrieve lumber from the lumberyard for raised beds. My oldest daughters accompanied me to pick up bags of rich soil, fertilizer and young vegetable and fruit plants from the garden store. We also bought five pairs of flowered gardening gloves for my four daughters and myself. We wore these as we situated the plants. Within three days, I realized my dream of a garden.
I watered in the morning, I checked in again in the late afternoon. I bought a wooden bench and placed it between the strawberries and green beans facing the Cedars. The bench in the garden became my favorite place to sip coffee in the morning. Birds chirped and flitted about their new playground. Dragonflies and honeybees explored my quiet place too. I bought flowers and planted them around the beds in cinder blocks turned on their sides. I had a beautiful, quiet place to myself if only for an hour each morning and a half an hour after noon.
Little Sam, my second youngest son, followed me out to the garden one morning. He wanted to help tend to the plants. He had developed a healthy fascination with seeing them grow and change. Sam became my little gardening partner. My special, quiet place was even better with Sam's company. I taught him to pull weeds but not plants, to sprinkle salt around the edge of the beds to stop snails in their tracks and I showed him how to pick off deadheads to make room for new flowers. Sam followed me out every morning once he knew he could help. He kept himself busy as I did my own tasks. One day, he called me over to the opposite end of the garden where he was. He sucked his left thumb and pointed with his right hand to mounds of dirt on the ground, stumped as to what this might mean. I knew exactly what they were. There before my very eyes were three mounds testifying to invasion by dirty thieves. Gofers!
I am generally a gentle person but I have no patience with sabotage. It must be stopped! The gofers would have to be dealt with. There was no other way.
"Sam, do you want a bigger job?" I asked him. He nodded enthusiastically with excitement in his eyes, eager for more responsibility. I went straight for the tool shed and found the smallest shovel, which was about four feet long. On my way back to the gopher hole, Sam trailing behind me, I picked up the hose. Back at the gopher's hideout I scooped the mound of dirt away with the shovel and exposed a hole in the ground with the circumference of a golf ball. I shoved the end of the garden hose three inches into the hole. Sam held the hose in place while I walked over to turn on the water. He waited patiently for the signal that would spur his next move. He had carefully listened to my instructions; he knew just what to do. When the water started to come back out of the hole around the spout of the hose, he pulled the hose out and raised the shovel. Soon, the rodent appeared and down came the shovel, demolishing the enemy of the garden.
Sam squealed and jumped up in the air. "I did it! I did it! He's dead, Mom!" He grinned from ear to ear, proud of his new skill and satisfied with his accomplishment. My little quiet place had a guard now. Sam proceeded to snuff out all gophers on our property, one by one. That day, he proclaimed himself the protector of Mom's garden. I was so proud. The enemy didn't have a chance.
While Sam was exterminating pesky rodents I decided it was time to expand the garden. I headed for my weed-whacker to clear the way. I revved the engine and went at it. Sticks, pebbles and stems were flung in the air, snapping and cracking as I slowly swung the weed demolisher back and forth. As soon as I had gotten into a rhythm, something seemed different. Something wasn't right about the way the rocks were flipping up into the air. They weren't falling back to the ground. There were more and more, quickly increasing in number and then I realized, they were not rocks. They were wasps! Terrified of bees of any kind, I threw my weed-whacker down onto the ground and jumped back, preparing to run for my life. The wasps, which had formed a slight whirling tornado around me, strangely appeared to be sucked back down to the ground with machine I had dropped. The fear left me and astonishment replaced it as I looked on in search of understanding. The wasps planted themselves, layering the weed-whacker in a swarm. They were retaliating against their attacker. I may have screamed when I threw down the tool because Sam had run to my side. Without a word, we stood there together and watched in amazement as the creepy-looking, yellow, flying insects attempted to devour the gasoline-powered machine. In amazement and fear little Sam grabbed my hand as we stared at the this shocking performance. I started to worry that they might come after us next so we called it a morning and headed inside.
Sam's excitement resumed as his siblings gathered around to hear the events of the morning garden excursion. The others were disappointed that they missed it. The next day, my younger girls, Nadia and Shelly came to help in the garden too. I am sure they were waiting for another outrageous sight as they played games, sang songs and ate strawberries. My quiet little place had become a fun place for the children as well. I didn't really want to be alone, anyway, I realized. My quiet place was better with the sounds and smiles of my kids.