One of the great things about gardens is variety. For example, some things grow quickly, yielding the fruits of your labor in just a few days (alfalfa sprouts spring to mind). And yet, other things grow more slowly, moving through various stages with great deliberation — from dicot, to bud, to showy flower, to fruit, and finally, to mouth (home grown tomatoes, anyone?).
Our friendship has been more of the deliberate variety. We were close friends for seven years before we made a lifetime commitment to each other. In the first week after making our commitment, we created a bucket list of things we’d like to taste, feel, see, and otherwise experience or accomplish together. One of our hopes was to grow a garden — but not just a metaphorical garden of joy and trust (although this is lovely, too). No, we’re talkin’ the real McCoy: dirt under the fingernails, weed-pulling backaches, scraping the muck off our boots, taste-buds-bursting-in-our-mouths gardening. However, initially, we didn’t have access to a plot of land. So, we decided to launch our garden one potted plant at a time. We started with a windowsill herb garden, and we began buying shelves of books (one can never have enough gardening books). Our dream was to obtain an actual garden plot within five years. And, lucky for us, sometimes dreams come true.
For three years, we traveled from state to state in Bridger, our 1969 VW Bus. Because we believe that sharing novel and exciting experiences is one of the best ways to create a happy and healthy relationship, we would often take interesting and challenging jobs together. One 
job (if you can call getting paid to live your dreams “a job”) was at a family campground in Maine. As “work campers,” we were given a plot of land and a small travel camper to live in for the summer. While there, we planted to our hearts content. We pulled out our trusty planters guide and resolved to get the largest yield we could out of one of the shortest growing seasons.
First stop: Johnny’s Seed Company’s farm in Albion, Maine. We purchased every kind of organic seed that we thought would grow in our little garden. We also attended Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association’s Common Ground Fair in Unity, Maine. After three days of seminars and growing classes, we were ready to get our hands dirty. We planted peppers of all sorts, snow peas, a variety of lettuce, chard, broccoli, cucumbers, tomatoes, green onions, carrots, radishes, marigolds, dianthus, petunias, various other flowers, and okra. Okra? In Maine?
All the old-timers and seasoned gardeners told us okra wouldn’t grow. We planted it anyway. Maybe it was the weather, the variety, beginner’s luck, or a combination of all three, but our okra not only grew, it grew big, and it was delicious fried.
One of the younger, more innovative owners of the campground noticed our garden and offered us a three year project, designing and installing a work camper community garden and a 10,000 square foot organic garden for the campground. The image below, labeled “From the lower field,” is a wide view of the garden.
We wanted dirty nails, aching backs, and muck-laden shoes, and that’s exactly what was 
delivered. Our garden project was to establish 18 community garden plots, two experimental gardens, and a larger full-scale garden to supply organic produce to the restaurant, a future tea pavilion, and the guests.
The full-scale garden was divided into eleven plots that would include a “three sisters” field (corn, pumpkin, and beans), a watermelon patch, a rhubarb and berry garden, an eggplant plot, a tomato “gallery” with 10 varieties, a cucumber “palette,” a greens garden, an herb and tea garden, a mint garden, an Aroma (bouquet flowers) garden, and a salad garden.
First, we cleared the land and had some large boulders removed. We staked, cleared, and covered each plot with weed mat and straw. For some gardens, we planted a thick cover crop of red clover to help build nutrients in the soil.
The mint garden was one of the first to be completed. It wasn’t long after we took the picture of the mint garden that the first sprouts of the cover crop pushed through the top soil.
For other gardens, such as the perennial Rhubarb/Strawberry garden, we laid weed mat down and heavily covered the entire plot with straw. We had learned that Rhubarb was quite hardy in Maine, so we were comfortable it would survive just fine.
For us, our Maine organic garden project was bitter sweet. We enjoyed every blister, long hour, aching muscle, and layer of dirt in our hair. In our experience, opportunities like that are rare. Yet, for some reason, it was dropped in our laps. Before we left Maine in the fall, we got to see the Rhubarb garden completed, and enjoy one last savory cucumber salad (pictured bottom right — our cukes in full bloom). It was difficult to leave our precious garden while it was still producing beautiful fruits and veggies.
Just on a side note, we shivered through almost the entire summer in Maine. Kara kept getting confused and referring to the season as “winter.” The ‘Mainiacs,’ as they affectionately call 
themselves, rolled their eyes and firmly corrected her. “Unlike California,” they’d add, “we have four seasons in Maine.” Well, summer or California-winter, it was one of the most exciting times of our lives.
The next spring we returned to begin the planting process. This is where the story gets sad. There were several campground owners, and for some reason (we’ve never known why), one of the senior owners didn’t think the garden was worth it. We were terribly disappointed, and in our excitement to take the job, we had committed to the project without a written contract. All we could do was gather up the remains of our precious dream and wait for another day (or year) to carry it through.
The moral of the story may be this: stop and smell the roses and savor the veggies, because sometimes they’re only here for a season. On the other hand, life has a way of giving and taking, twisting and turning, and somehow we manage to stay on the garden path. This may be the end of this blog segment, but it’s certainly not the end of our gardening story.
This project has been one of the most memorable adventures we have had together. Regardless of the outcome, we look back on that time with joy and fondness. We hope that by sharing our experience, we have inspired you to keep dreaming together.
In Kindness,
~JnK