Urban Gardening

Gardening is a bit of a challenge when you live in a second story apartment without a balcony. However, the rent is so cheap and the neighborhood so good that you aren't tempted to move to a more gardening friendly locale, so you make it work. Yes, "you" is me, bear with me here.

Last year, I grew tomatoes and several herbs in a large west facing window.

This year I want to expand. I have permission to place containers around the front steps of my four-plex. That's great. It's not enough. Hey, when you dream, dream big. Even when your dreams exceed your means it's a good exercise. Talking with a friend the other night about a possible opportunity that might be coming my way, he pointed out a couple of things I hadn't considered that pertained to the long term possibilities of the opportunity. Sorry if that's incredibly ambiguous -- it boils down to something very simple. Thinking and living merely in terms of survival can blind you to the big picture, the long run, opportunities and dreams. The whole point of survival is to make it through to get to bigger and better things. Those dreams can become reality, so keep dreaming, you never know what will happen when you least expect it.

Last year I put myself on the waiting list for the Picardo P-Patch, Seattle's oldest and biggest community garden.

It's just a few blocks from my house and very popular. It's not uncommon to spend a couple of years on P-Patch waiting lists in Seattle. I just heard last week that I'm up for a 10 x 10 plot of land to grow whatever my heart desires. Or, more accurately, whatever I can get in the ground that can be harvested by October 15th, since it's a short season plot. Even more accurately, whatever I can get to grow in my very first and very experimental non-container garden.

I would say wish me luck, but apparently telling everyone I know (read: friends, family, Facebook and Twitter) is enough to bring incredibly generous offers of seedlings and tools. I've been told the plot needs some work before anything can be planted so I'm assuming I'm benefiting from someone abandoning the plot, and that's also why I'm getting it so late in the season. And talk about generous -- people have actually offered to help me get it ready and plant it. Sometimes, I forget that people do these things. It's the hazard of single parenthood. And with people like that in my life, who needs luck?

Of course I'll be documenting my gardening progress this summer, in the window, on the steps and in the P-Patch. That's the point of a blog anyway, right? In the meantime, you wouldn't believe all the information available from a quick Google search on the topic of Urban Gardening. It's going to be hard to concentrate on work this week...