Friday, July 15, 2011

Gardening: Science, Faith, Slugs

A successful slug hunting mission. Die, mollusks, die.

Gardening. It's supposed to be rewarding. Your own hands raised that kale in the kale and tomato pasta you're about to eat. Same with the kale in the kale salad you just finished. And the kale chips you have as a side. And the kale cheesecake that's for dessert.

There's a lot of kale when you garden, is what I'm saying. It's unkillable and even the slugs don't like the stuff. Unlike your precious basil, which like your dreams of a Summer of Pesto, lies in tatters thanks to their slimy ways. Something like Murphy's Law is at work when you garden, except instead of anything that could possibly go wrong doing so at the worst possible time, everything you actually want to eat will wither right before it's ready and you will be left with fields of kale.

A second law of gardening: the outcome is inversely related to the level of input. Whatever you fertilize, prune and stake with the greatest of care will still only be tenuously clinging life- or at least the aforementioned stake is still keeping its withered carcass upright- while the rhubarb you've completely ignored is doing just fine. Which means, on the bright side, it's time for pie.

And, just when you think gardening can be reduced to a series of laws as well-defined as those for thermodynamics (looking at my lemongrass, the concept of entropy does spring to mind), the supernatural steps in. Your swiss chard resurrects (Christianity). And you smush a slug, creating something not unlike a John Carpenter movie (Satanism).

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