Doing What It Takes!!!!

My brother, Buddy, and I grew up on a farm where my parents planted a garden every spring and summer.  Flowers, vegetables,  and fruits were given tender loving care.  The produce was either frozen or canned for consumption during the winter months.  Most aspects of a garden are wonderful, but there were things that Buddy and I endured and/or creatively avoided as best we could. 

Harvesting a garden is fun, but can be tedious and a lot of work every day.  I remember tilling the ground and preparing it for the seeds and plants to be placed gingerly and properly.  The ground felt so soft and smooth between my toes.  After school we would water the garden and as time went on we watched the garden produce a harvest.  As the tomatoes grew we watched for huge green worms and sprayed them.  We watched for rabbits, birds, and turtles eating our produce. 

My favorite parts were the corn and zinnias.  As the corn grew to six feet my brother and I loved running between the rows playing hide and seek.  Picking the zinnias and arranging them was fun.  We picked and ate homegrown vegetables such as cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, strawberries, peas, and green beans all summer long. 

All these vegetables would not only be eaten fresh, but would also be canned or frozen.  This was the second part of the work.  Picking and canning could take hours.  My family felt it was worth every effort.  Overall we were very blessed to have this bounty, except for one vegetable.   

The one vegetable I very much disliked was green beans.  My mother would can dozens of jars of these nasty tasting pods.  Freshly cooked green beans are okay, but canned I never liked, and still do not.  It seemed that we were served green beans every meal, except for breakfast.  My parents required Buddy and I to eat them.  I grew weary.  John Lithgow said once that “Out of suffering comes creativity.  You cannot spell painting without pain.”  My imagination and creativity kicked into high gear to figure out ways to fake eating green beans and relieve my suffering.

I would make sure I had a pocket on my shirt so I could nonchalantly drop the beans in my pocket, and then go outside to get rid of the evidence.  I could accidentally drop them on the floor.  Sometimes I would drop a bean or two in my glass of milk, or sneak them back in the serving bowl.  Another method was to drop the beans in my napkin and put the napkin in the trash, but this did not work as well.  It was difficult to avoid our parent’s watchful stares.  I, also, kept an eye on my parents.  When they talked passionately about an event during the day, I could hide the beans in the broken upholstery of the chair and later remove them. 

One evening after supper I walked into the kitchen to see my parents dismantling the chairs.  “What is in the padding of this chair?  Why it looks like green beans?”  I nonchalantly walked to the sink to fill my glass with water, and then started to leave the kitchen.  “What do you know about this?” asked my Dad?  I said, “I was sick and tired of eating green beans and I hid them in the chair!”  I don’t remember what the punishment was, but, it was worth it.

Years later I came to understand that my parents raised me with all the knowledge they possessed at the time.  Today my family and I laugh about all the creative ways my brother and I avoided eating our green beans.  As I matured over the years, I became creative in the preparation of green beans.  I found that if the green beans are spiced and cooked to slightly crisp there is a much better taste to them.   

I agree with Mary Lou Cook who said, “Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes, and having fun.”  I invented and experimented with new ways to avoid eating green beans and later with preparing a better tasting green bean.  I took a risk, broke the rules, and made mistakes in this process.  In the end the memory I created was fun for the whole family.