All women like to garden, don’t they? My mother always had a yard full

of flowers and a garden full of vegetables. They say I took after her.

We may have had similar features and attitudes but, when it came to

gardening, we parted ways.

I don’t like gardening or yard work. I don’t like to be out in the weather because it is always too hot or too cold or too wet or … you know. I’d rather be at the typewriter. But, one day,

I decided to try my hand at gardening.

George was always my gardener, faithful through the years whether things grew or not. If they didn’t, he would simply replant the next year without grumbling. Now it’s up to me.

I have several fine workers to do the mowing and weed-eating, maybe even to use a power saw. At a price, of course, but it was another problem facing me now put to rest as long as the bank keeps doling out the money. There was one good Samaritan with a riding mower who did one section of lawn just as a good neighbor and I praise him. The others, though, live by their earnings and I honor their willingness to do hard work.

Since the lawns look nice, the flower beds look even worse than before. If it ever stops raining, I may go out and see if I can tell the difference between weeds and flowers.

Funny you should mention that. Much as I hate the thought of making weed and flower determinations, I did decide one day that my half-keg planters needed pansy replacing. Into the car and to town I went, returning with a box of six. It was too cold and wet to set them out, I thought, so I put them in the cool back room to “adjust” along with my Thanksgiving cactus that I had recently repotted to a larger container.

A few days later I saw the ad “three waves for $10.” Well, maybe I could use some more pansies, especially at the sale price. Back to the store I went and made my purchase. It was then that the clerk said something about my petunias. Petunias? I thought I had again picked out pansies, but they must have been side by side and I picked up the wrong ones. Oh, well. With pansies already purchased, I would go ahead and take the petunias, for they would look nice along the sidewalk. I took them home and added them to the flower garden growing in my back room. Very pretty.

A few days later, in conversation about planting things, the subject of tomatoes was brought up. I don’t eat a lot of tomatoes, mainly those that come on my restaurant sandwiches, but the word “old-fashioned” reached me. I had always thought that a tomato was a tomato. Not so. Over the years tomatoes and other plants have been mauled and manipulated so that they grow faster, change shape and are graded according to climate changes but lack the flavor of the old-timers. Some even grow, unnaturally, upside down.

As our mouths watered at the thought of those full-flavored tomatoes fresh from the garden, someone mentioned that a nursery had some of the old-fashioned tomato plants and seeds. That’s when my ears pricked right up, for I did long to enjoy the taste of yore.

Oh, to taste one of those sun-grown tomatoes once again from my mother’s garden. Since that was no longer possible, it seemed logical at the moment that I buy my own plant and eat my own juicy red tomato. Only then could I compare the taste of both and judge for myself if the old-fashioned one did taste better.

So, I took myself out to the nursery (a long trip for me) and purchased two plants – one of the old-fashioned kind and one of the newer variety but with a shorter growing period. I couldn’t wait long enough to bother with planting seeds.

As I drove home I considered where I would plant the tomatoes. George’s regular garden space was full of tall dead weeds and wire, a cleanup job in itself. No, I wanted them closer to the house, anyway, and secure from the attention of the deer. The two half-keg planters just outside my door would be perfect. But, what about my pansies? If I didn’t put them in the planters, where else would they look best?

I noted that the snow had not yet left Mount Emily and just then remembered that we don’t plant until that happens, usually in June. It was still too cold to put the tomato plants outside, so on arriving home, I managed to pack them without breakage into the cool back room with my Thanksgiving cactus, pansies and petunias. I had a regular nursery of my own under way.

A few days later I decided that all the little children in the nursery might be thirsty, so I took them a drink of water. The colorful bell-shaped faces of the petunias turned toward me in welcome, and I felt like a regular gardener. That is, if I didn’t have to get dirty planting them outside and then keep them watered and the weeds away.

The Thanksgiving cactus needed just a bit of water as it struggled valiantly to survive my repotting efforts, so I gave it my tender care.

Then I turned to my container of pansies. Did you know that they have changed the old-fashioned flowers as well as vegetables and fruit? They don’t make pansies like they used to either.

They look exactly like petunias!

* * * * *

It was destined to be. I attended the OTEC annual meeting and dinner May 15. It was a very nice event and they even gave away 71 prizes.

I didn’t win any of those, of course, but at the end they gave away pots of flowers that decorated the tables. Because I sat at the table with an orange dot at my place, I received the one there.

Of course, you already know what it was. It was a lovely pink petunia.

Thank you, OTEC!

Veteran newspaperwoman Dorothy Swart Fleshman is a La Grande native. Her column runs every Friday. Reach her by e-mail at fleshman@eoni.com.