by Elizabeth Ely

Created on: May 19, 2010   Last Updated: June 07, 2010

My Greenhouse Sod Story

“Let's get a greenhouse,” I said. It sounded like a good idea at the time. A little glass sanctuary for growing heat-loving fruits and veggies, and a winter escape from which to view the world of my backyard. Such a good idea…

“Yeah Mom, they're going to install it, but we have to dig…”

“What do you mean we?” she asked conspiratorially knowing full well what I meant.

“You caught that huh?” I smiled. My mom, always my partner in crime. We may come from different generations, but there's rarely any gap. Whatever we get into, we're just two crazy people, tackling stuff we probably shouldn't sometimes. But what a boring way to live that would be. Not to mention not nearly as funny.

Knowing all along we would do this together too, she innocently asked, “So, what are we doing?”

“Well, just digging up about…well…just 10 by 16 feet of sod,” I said, rushing that last part.

“Is that all dear daughter? Are you nuts?”

“Come on, we haven't gotten ourselves into trouble lately.”

“And won't again if we don't survive this one.”

“It won't be that bad Mom. Grass roots aren't that long.”

Oh, how my words would haunt me. The roots may have been only a few inches, but what inches they were. It didn't help it was early summer when the ground was already nice and dry, and hard.

As Mom was digging her shovel into the ground, it seemed to barely go in before meeting the dry soil's angry resistance. “You better plant me a ton of cherry tomatoes after this.”

“First thing to go in. Sweet 100s.”

“Make that Sweet Millions.” Nothing like using plant names for dramatic emphasis.

“That's if we ever finish this,” I moaned. “We've been at it for hours and barely made a dent.”

“At least we got the area marked off yesterday,” she wisely pointed out, “so we know where to dig.”

“It seemed like we'd never get it right,” I still complained. This was harder than I thought. Opting to take a page from my mother's optimism book, I decided to try to see the humor. “Of course it might have helped if I'd actually had a long enough tape measure.”

“Then where would have been the challenge?”

We continued to tear at the hard sod, little pieces at a time, gouging the ground with shovels, hoes, and picks as makeshift sod removers.

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