The last of the winter squash. We cooked and mashed any that seemed worth salvaging on Monday afternoon. Those raised this coming summer won't be ready until next September.

March 1, 2016 - Tuesday
-1 degrees/cloudy skies/calm winds
Pentoga Road

The white-out conditions that blew through yesterday finished after less than an hour and left us with sunny skies and cold temperatures. It was thirty degrees Monday morning when I first awakened. Three hours later, it was fifteen and quickly sinking. The cold front had definitely come through.

Temperatures are forecast to be in the upper forties, even reaching fifty, next week, signaling the possibility of an early spring. It wouldn't hurt my feelings to be able to work outside, soak up some springtime sun, and emerge from the winter cocoon that surrounds most northerners this time of the year.  

I could become a big fan of El Nino winters in the North Country. It's been cold enough for the winter enthusiasts, warm enough to make the season more bearable, and wet enough that we're not crying for more precipitation. It's a win/win/win situation. 

Though only in the teens, the temperature in the solar heater was so hot yesterday afternoon that it drew the polycarbonate panel inwards. As soon as I started the fan, the panel went back to its normal position. 

Speaking of warm weather, I spent no small amount of time Monday with my nose stuck in a catalogue ordering flower seeds. 

Flowers? Uh huh. 

I've always planted a smattering of flowers, just enough to accent the garden, but I generally leave the pretty stuff up to Sargie. She's the one with taste. I'm the person who digs in the dirt.

That being said, I was enamored with the few flowers that grew in last year's vegetable garden. Their brilliant purples, reds, and yellows really accented the dark green colors of the surrounding vegetable leaves. If a little is good, then why not try more?

A cosmos in last year's garden

I actually began growing flowers long before trying my hand at vegetables. We lived in northern Illinois at the time. I was ten years old and in Mrs. Bailes' fourth grade class.

There was a patch of bare ground between the window wells of the basement in the rear of the house where nothing grew. I remember peppering Dad with typical little-kid questions about gardening when he asked if I'd like to plant and tend something in that sofa-size patch of ground.

My very own garden? Just mine? I couldn't believe my luck. After promising to keep it watered and weed free, Dad conveyed the seasonal ownership of two by five foot piece of dirt and handed me a small packet of flower seed.

 A field of dreams was born.

My first attempt at gardening produced a weed-free, but very crooked row of flowers, Bachelor Buttons, producing straw-like blooms of many colors. I pulled the very first ones, (roots and all) ran in the house, and gave them to Mom. She cut off the roots and placed the flowers in a drinking glass half filled with water in the middle of the kitchen table. I was hooked.  

Years went by that I planted nothing. Life consumed my time, school, work, and helping to raise a family.  

It was in the early 80's that Gerster Valley Produce was born, several rocky acres of vegetables; tomatoes, peppers, melons, squash, and pumpkins. We sold produce, mostly to the tourists who drove by on their way to camp and fish at a local lake. It was also during that time that I was asked to write a gardening column, The Gerster Gardener, by our local paper, but that's another story for another time. 

Full of big ideas and energy, but lacking in common sense and knowledge of how to successfully market and run a produce operation, Gerster Valley Produce flopped. I didn't give a hoot about actually selling what I grew, but rather, I loved the growing part of the operation.

After having some decent family gardens in northern Maine, I moved to Alaska. You want a challenge, try growing vegetables north of the Arctic Circle. I did plant cold weather crops one year on a sand bar surrounded by the river that flowed in front of my cabin. The day came when I went to harvest my first peas and discovered the entire garden had been destroyed by a grizzly bear and her cubs. I gave up any thoughts of growing a garden.

Years passed and it came time to think of where to retire. Alaska... the Last Frontier... great fishing, hiking, and where most my friends lived, or, the Upper Peninsula of Michgan, lots of woods, water, land, and a climate where I could at least grow a short season garden. The rest is history.

So I'll be making an attempt at growing a few flowers this year; asters, several varieties of sunflowers, cosmos, and nasturtiums are a few of the easier varieties. There are others, more delicate, that I'll start indoors in the next few weeks along with the usual vegetable seeds. Two indoor green houses will adorn the windows in our living room this year and both Sargie and I will exhale a big sigh of relief when the nights finally become warm enough that I can move everything out to the large greenhouse in the garden.

I'll probably plant too much, grow too much, harvest too much, and give most of it away. Ah, what the heck. It's all Dad's fault. He's the one who gave that little ten-year-old boy, the fourth grader who was a student in Mrs. Bailes' room, a little patch of dirt between two window wells behind a house in northern Illinois. 

Dad handed me a bit of money in my growing-up years and occasionally gave me the keys to the family car, but the most important thing Dad ever handed me was that package of flower seeds.

Page Two:

Poor Sargie has an infection, one of those kinds that occasionally rears its ugly head. She had a few pills left over from the last bout, but has run out and naturally, her doctor is off today. She tried talking to him yesterday, but he surrounds himself with a fanged staff of nurses that breathe fire and who would be better suited to star as Gate Keepers in the next Ghost Busters movie. We're going to have to do something today. Sargie's not feeling too good; a lousy way to spend one's vacation.

I scraped the drive yesterday, cleaning the residue from the morning's blizzard. Some places were bare while drifts of up to a foot covered other's. 

But mostly, we hung out in the house and kept it all low key. We did make our run into town, but came right back home so Sargie could take it easy.

A VERY happy Ivy

I'm not sure what's on today's agenda. I need to get more lumber for the last of the strawberry pyramids. I'm hoping Sargie will be able to get in and see a doctor somewhere so we might kill two birds with one stone... or at least kill an infection and pick up some lumber in one trip.

Until then, I believe I'll listen to the news, feed the wood stove, and sip coffee.

Back at work along Louisiana's Gulf Coast, Andy sent a picture of a recent meal, mud bugs... crawdaddies... crayfish. They were one of my favorite food groups while attending Southern Miss many years ago.

After all, a man's work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road...