……..My daughter has become a city farmer? Well, that seems like an oxymoron, but all the years she spent living “out the highway” as we locals say, she never once had a garden. While she enjoyed the veggies of her neighbors’ labor, she never once bothered to learn about the enemies farmers face every day. Until now.

………Shannon purchased her much-loved Aunt Marsha and Uncle Bill Webster’s house and has been in residency for several weeks. Even before she moved in, however, she was excited about having a garden. It was her Uncle Bill’s pride and joy and his tomatoes were legend. Shannon never thought about where they came from. She knew as a child, there was a picnic table chock full of tomatoes down near the fence, Every visit would end with “do want to take some tomatoes”. I would say “a couple” and my sister would disappear into the house and return with a crumpled grocery sack and say “take all you want.” We would examine every tomato like we were buying a precious jewel until Uncle Bill would take pity on us and tell us which ones were the best.

…..As we piled in the car and headed home, Shannon recalls her mind would already be conjuring up tomato sandwichs, tomato salads, pasta with tomato. She no longer would be reduced to hard waxen tomatoes to be found at the store. This was the real thing. It was one of her favorite summertime memories.

……And, now she was going to grow her own tomatoes and make her own memories. A few weeks before she even moved in, she planted her garden. She has tomatoes, green peppers, zucchini, pumpkins(?) and a plethora of veggies which will be a pleasant surprise because she got confused at the end of planting. Each morning, she reported the progress of the tomatoes to me. She had transformed into a true farmer…..life was good and she diligently watered that garden every day. No drought was going to defeat her.

………But it was a rabbit who first threated the garden. Then it was a deer. I didn’t believe her. How could a deer jump the fence which surrounds the entire yard. She made me come and look and sure enough there was a big hoof print smack dab in the garden. She prepared for battle. She found four fake owls in the shed and lined them up around the tomatoes. She found multiple wind chimes. It the wind blew the right way I expected to see a pope or bishop appear. She was single focused. And, finally she came face to face with the deer. She and her cavadoodle, Rooney, were sitting on the patio at 9 p.m. last week when Rooney became so excited he broke through his baby gate in hot pursuit of the deer who was preparing to chomp on his feast. Shannon followed chasing Rooney and there she was face to face with what she claimed was the largest deer in the world. She has abandoned her theory that the deer is jumping her fence. She says he is so big he merely steps over it. She scooped up her little dog and the deer turned and sauntered off. Evidently, he did not think her worthy of battle.

…….As a mother, this falls under the “What were you thinking?” category. “Deers can hurt you. Never approach a deer they will slice you with their hoofs and they have wonderful tomatoes at R&R and they will even help you pick the good ones.”

…….But now she is obsessed, maybe even possessed with saving her garden from the deer who she has given a name so vile I will not repeat it. Just in case, however, she has declared this garden her “practice garden” and vowed to produce a garden next year that will make Uncle Bill proud.

(If you have any suggestions for Shannon on her garden dilemma, please pass them along to [email protected] or stop by her garden.)

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