Dirt

There is something about the dirt in my garden beds. I can plunge my hand into that soil with very little effort, opening up holes for the new tomato plants. 

I swear I can see the excitement in their leaves when they first taste their new home. But maybe I am just imagining that. 

I look closer. 

I can see strands of old hay, some dark and black and almost dirt, some still retaining a bit of gold from a summer in the sun. 

Right there is a tiny wad of white fluff imported on the cramped roots of a nursery plant. 

I see a bit of bark from the mulch I used one year. The rib of an oak leaf, a few grains of gritty sand. 

There, in my palm, is a small stone. Much older than all this other stuff, it could tell me stories if I knew the language. 

I know what’s in this dirt, mostly, because I made it myself. 

When the raised beds were built a few years ago I didn’t have enough dirt to fill them. I had the excavated soil from the foundation of our room addition. I had a barn full of old hay. So, I made garden lasagna; a layer of hay, and layer of dirt, a layer of hay, a layer of dirt and finishing off with a layer of sawdust cheese! 

I sprinkled two buckets of red worms liberally, for seasoning. (to taste?) 

I grew the best garden I have ever seen that year. Worms oozed up in the paths between the beds when it rained and migrated into the yard. 

The broccoli heads didn’t fit in a gallon bag! 

My dirt is alive. I feed it old hay now and it rewards me with vegetables. I clean a barn stall and add a layer to the beds in the fall. Ashes from the fireplace get sprinkled on through out the winter. My worms do a pretty good job of stirring on warm damp days. 

The smell when it rains is that humusy organic aroma that gardeners love. 

  

I imagine the tiny root threads and microscopic mold creatures crawling thru a dark maze of decaying organic matter and plant bits. 

The huge pink bodies of the worms pushing thru them, gobbling them up. 

I think I will go play in the dirt...