Doing a Dumb Thing

Today I may have done one of the dumbest things I’ve done in a while.  I planted garlic. 

I’ve never grown garlic before but they say the way to grow garlic in northern climates is to plant it in the fall before the ground is frozen.  You plant the cloves about 6 inches deep in the soil and then cover it with dead leaves or other mulch and let it be over winter.  In the spring you remove the mulch and the garlic will sprout and then the bulbs of garlic can be harvested in the summer.

If this winter in the Midwest is going to be anything like “they” are saying it’s going to be (worse than last year), I’m pretty sure that garlic doesn’t have a chance.  Why did I just put perfectly good cloves of garlic into the soil?  This goes against all common sense and logic.  Put something into soil that is going to freeze very soon, be covered with inches and inches of snow for months, and then expect it will grow and flourish in the spring?  Yeah right.

There is so much going up against the garlic: bugs and worms and other critters that may disturb the garlic over the winter, the soon to be frozen ground, feet of snow, sub-zero temperatures for weeks.  And then there are all the challenges the garlic will face in the spring and summer: making sure no one accidently plants something else where the garlic is before it sprouts, getting the right amount of water and sun, weeds, being harvested at the right time, more bugs and other pests. 

And to top it all off, the garlic has absolutely no control over any of these external factors.  It can only do what it can with the environment it is put in.  Honestly I feel really bad for that poor garlic.

And yet garlic was created to do exactly what good sense would tell us it cannot do.  Garlic was designed to withstand and overcome all of what we think would prevent it from growing and developing beautifully.  It was made for this. 

This may sound weird, but I realized as I was putting the garlic into the soil that I have far more in common with that garlic than I ever would have thought: the immense obstacles, patiently waiting for the right time, not being in control, doing what may seem illogical, needing so much and yet so little to develop.  I was made for this.

I really, really hope this garlic story has a happy ending.