My Garden of Weeden

By Doris Willman 

After contracting polio in 1953, I faced the challenge of leg braces and crutches. By 1981, I became a wheelchair user with post-polio syndrome. By this time, my three daughters were quite self-sufficient and I had some blessed leisure time.

Coming from a family of avid gardeners, I thought, why not me too? My knowledge of gardening was quite limited, except for minor chores back home in the family garden before I acquired a disability. I obtained a copy of The Complete Vegetable Garden by John Seymore. And a very compassionate husband, fortunately for me, was handy with carpentry tools.

At first we erected four planters, measuring eight feet long and two feet wide with a depth of approximately 14 inches. These planters were supported by legs and cross braces to make an overall height of about 28 inches.

The planters were placed parallel to each other, with ample room to manoeuvre the wheelchair between each one. Each planter was filled with purchased garden soil and peat moss. A lightweight garden hose took care of the watering needs. My first crops consisted of radishes, onions, carrots, beets, Swiss chard and tomatoes.

There is an advantage to container planting: Because of the wide row system, radishes, carrots and the like can be spaced as little as two inches apart.

A good-sized crop can be harvested from a confined space. Close planting also creates shading, eliminating most weeds while retaining moisture in the soil. Most crops require tilling the soil only to a depth of eight inches. This can readily be done with small hand tools. Cucumbers, a vine crop, can be trained up five-foot poles and still be within easy reach of a gardener using a wheelchair. The height of the planters enables the wheelchair user to garden with a minimum of exertion. You are also in a position to make eye contact with any garden pests — get a jump on the flea beetle before he lands on your prized tomatoes!

My planters were so successful that my husband then built my “Garden of Weeden.” This garden is 45 feet long by 30 feet wide. With the exception of a small tool shed and gateway, two-foot-wide planters extend around the full perimeter. The central area comprises three planters measuring 10 feet by four feet, lawn space bordered with flowers, and a few small shrubs thrown in.

A wooden walkway provides sufficient space to service all planting areas. A watering hose is mounted at each end of the garden.

Unless you are a fanatic gardener like myself, a garden this size is an option rather than a necessity. Much success and pleasure can be derived from smaller ones.

I can truly say my “Garden of Weeden” has been my utopia — a place where I can get lost in the magic of nature. Stress evaporates once I wheel through that gate and am in complete control of my surroundings. I spend so much time in my garden, I expect my wheelchair tires will one day take root.

Like the saying goes, we have to “stop and smell the roses.” My philosophy is, “Let’s grow ’em!”

 

In memory of my close personal friend, Doris, now gardening in Heaven

February 20, 1939 - June 25, 2015

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I LOVE YOU DORIS WILLMAN

If I ramble today, please forgive me.

Some people in the field of writing might say there’s no such thing as writer’s block — that it’s all in the head – and the bottom line is that’s it’s nothing more than a temporary inability to produce original content.

I know there are reasons why someone like me could possibly be at a loss for words because I’ve been in these situations before, no matter what you call it. Maybe I don’t feel like writing, for instance. Or I’m lazy. There are times when words just won’t come out right and, as far as I’m concerned, they flow like a one-legged duck trying to swim up a trickling stream. Another reason might be shock. Yes, shock. The shock and anguish you feel after losing a near and dear friend. That’s what happened.

Doris Willman was the best and truest type of friend a person could ever ask for in life. Strong-willed, feisty, witty, intelligent, sensitive, caring, loyal and never afraid to tell it like it is or give me a piece of her mind, she suddenly left her quaint and comfortable home in Halifax yesterday morning and I have been wafting in and out of “surreality” since I got the news. How could I possibly write when I’m mourning the loss of my friend? Because I have to tell you about her and what she meant to me. What we did for each other. That’s why. Because she is THAT important!

I met Doris on my Marinade Dave blog as I was sprawled out in a hospital bed with pneumonia. I posted a short article on Christmas Eve 2008 called Casey Anthony’s Christmas Tree. She left her first comment under the pseudonym detwill39: “I believe the slacks that were washed by Cindy belonged to Casey but I may be mistaken. Hope you feel better soon, Dave, not a nice time of year to be sick.”

The next comment came two weeks later on a post titled Creepy Cryptic Casey. She wondered about the Casey Anthony/Zenaida Gonzalez connection and wrote, “Dave, your input on the above, PLEASE!”

The rest is history. She was hooked on my writing and, with each passing day, her input grew and grew. As nice as she was, she was very demanding, and I respected that. I’ve always liked and admired independent women. She was fiercely so. She wanted answers and if I was ever going to be any good at the subject matter I was writing about, I needed to do my homework and provide her and every other reader with the facts. Cut and dry, but she recognized I had a way with words that made things clear and easy to read, like you’re right there with me. The more information I could provide, the more she could decipher. She wanted bits and pieces that could be used as evidence in the case. I dug and I dug and I dug, and it led me to exposing one State witness as a fraud. If I was driven, she helped make me a 4-wheel drive.

While I was focused on the truth, so was she. On many occasions, our versions didn’t see eye-to-eye and we locked horns. Oh boy, did we! There were times when I felt like giving her the boot, but there was something about her spirited ways that wouldn’t allow me to let her go. She did leave and flaunt herself on other blogs for months at a time, much to my chagrin, but she always meandered back to mine. She even created her own and I was glad to help her set it up. What we developed was a love/hate relationship. We were like Abbott & Costello, Laurel & Hardy, oil & vinegar and salt & pepper, all rolled into one. The yin to my yang. She was my Sgt. Joe Friday with a cutting edge sense of humor. On the blog, we complemented each other like no one else. Ultimately, it was a true friendship type of love that grew because we really, really got to be the best of friends. I learned a lot about her family and she learned about mine. When my father passed away last year, she was right there, just as good friends always are.

In April of 2010, Casey Anthony’s defense filed a motion demanding that Judge Stan Strickland recuse himself. It was based on two articles I wrote prior to the judge complimenting me in the courtroom. What’s interesting about this is that I had my share of 15 minutes of fame, but, most importantly, I was accused by some in the peanut gallery of secretly working for the defense to take down the judge in order to throw the case. Of course, it was nothing like that, but those Internet trolls went on the warpath, hellbent on taking me down. Who immediately came to my defense? Yes, Doris. She was a real warrior who stuck to her guns. As they attacked me, they turned their attention to her, too. They published her address and phone number. It hurt her tremendously. I reassured her that no one was going to get a passport to go to Canada. She was safe. Those people were all talk (which they were.) Don’t worry about them. They threatened to throw me off the courthouse roof. I knew better. Her? They were going to ram her wheelchair into a snowbank and leave her there to freeze. BABs they were called. Bald Ain’t Beautiful. When the trial ended, they disappeared into the weeds, like the vermin they were. By then, Doris and I were hardened and seasoned pros. Stronger than ever. Talk about growing pains.

We went through a lot together and we were bonded, so bonded that we often spoke to each other by phone, sometimes every week. What was it about? Friends just being friends. Advice. Small talk. Certainly crimes! But what was it about her? How do you explain the way friendships develop and evolve? That she was forthright and honest goes without saying. We earned each others’ trust.

Yes, Doris was in a wheelchair. On Sunday, when we spoke, she said she had searched and searched for the article she had written years earlier for Abilities magazine. There was no trace of it on Google. I told her I’d look, too, but she was quite the Internet snoopysleuth. Nope, it’s not there. Titled, Garden of Weeden, I couldn’t find it, either. She told me so. Smart cookie that she was. I called the magazine this morning but they only archive back to 2011. I read it once and it was a fantastic article, but I have no idea where. In an April 2009 e-mail, she told me, “I just wanted to explain why I do not discuss my disability but don’t mind showing off my abilities…LOL.”

Doris was loaded with abilities and she had the ability to push me forward. On Sunday, she told me she loved me. I told her I loved her, too.” On Tuesday, she called me about the Charleston case and that was the last time we spoke. As much as the digital world is alienating people, we connected over the world of electricity. Call our friendship a “current affair.” (She would love that!) We never met face-to-face.

How much I write in the future will depend on what intrigues me, but there are many things I want to cover. She complained that I wasn’t writing enough, yet she beamed when I did. I have one story I planned on writing and I expected to hear her thoughts on it. I think about it now and it’s like a void. I know I didn’t write just for her, but her opinion was always important. From now on, I am going to feel a charge zapping my through my brain, as if she’s poking me with a cattle prod, reaching out with one hand from a pearly gate, standing. There’s nothing I will write without thinking of her.

“Get busy, Buster!” And from now on, I dedicate all of my future writing to the memory of Doris Willman. She was my perfect sidekick. Or was I hers?

The Roof of All Evil

When I was around seven-years-old, I went squirrel hunting with my father. We were out in the woods somewhere in New Jersey when, suddenly, I spotted one of the critters up in a tree.

“Look, Dad!” I loudly and proudly proclaimed, pointing up into the tree at the innocent little guy minding his own business. Up went the gun…

BAM!!!

Down came the squirrel, crashing to the ground with a light thump, about twenty feet or so below. I ran over to it to see the prize. It jerked and choked and gasped for air. I looked into his eyes and watched them glaze over as he took his final breath. It was a horrible experience — to watch death unfold. There’s just something weird about looking into the eyes of something or someone as they die.

I turned to my father, visibly shaken, and said that I never wanted to go hunting with him again. I never did, and soon afterward, he stopped, too.

To this very day, I have never owned a gun and I have no desire to ever possess one. But that doesn’t make me an anti-gun person. I’ve enjoyed target practice in the past, although it’s been many years. I totally abhor shooting animals for game, but I’m not opposed to hunting for food. After all, I am a meat eater and I seem to look the other way when it comes to how chickens, for example, are treated by food giants like ConAgra and their many subsidiaries. I am trying to be more conscientious when it comes to the humane treatment of animals. Humane. How could you possibly show compassion or benevolence toward a creature whose sole purpose from birth on is to become food? That’s a question to chew on, but I won’t dwell on it right now since this is mostly about guns, Charleston, and the Second Amendment stating that “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

I’m not here to argue the rights and wrongs of gun control, but I do agree with the president (and anyone else who thinks) that we need to have a vigorous and rigorous debate regarding how easy they are to purchase. I’m not stupid enough to feel the necessity to take guns away because some people want it that way. Guns will always be around and there’s no denying it. I think a minimum/mandatory sentence imposed on someone caught with an illegal firearm is something to consider, like 25 years. No parole. That may help to get them off the street, but it wouldn’t have stopped Dylann Roof from mercilessly slaughtering nine people inside of a House of God. He bought his legally. It was a simple thing to do. Too simple in some states.

(There’s some question about Roof’s gun purchase. Federal law prohibits people like Roof from obtaining firearms because, in February, he was arrested and later charged with felony possession of Suboxone, a narcotic prescription drug. He was released, and the case is pending. Because of this, Roof shouldn’t have been able to buy from a gun store. Federally licensed gun dealers are required to run background checks and this pending charge would have turned up as a red flag. According to his uncle, Roof got his pistol as a birthday present from his father, Reuters reported. No background checks are necessary in private transactions in South Carolina and the seller is not obligated to ask about felonies or felony indictments, although it is illegal to give guns as gifts to those people. If Roof’s father knew about the indictment, he could spend 10 years behind bars.)

Unfortunately, there’s no way to stop the crazies of the world from doing what they set out to do, and Roof is a perfect example of that and more. While I’m against the death penalty, this guy deserves to be snuffed out, with no grave or marker of any kind to identify him. He is evil through and through and he is proof positive that racism is pure evil, even in its simplest form. Nothing good ever comes out of evil. Ever.

What Roof did should open a debate about guns and rightly so; however, I’m hearing some disturbing things about this terrorist attack on humanity. Anyone who thinks this wasn’t terrorism should think about the terror in the eyes of Roof’s victims as he fired away. That was terror in its rawest form.

So what does a National Rifle Association executive in Texas have to say about it? Houston-based attorney Charles Cotton suggested that the murdered pastor of the church bears some of the blame for his opposition to permitting concealed handguns inside his house of worship. On TexasCHLForum.com, he insanely, absurdly wrote about the pastor of the church and South Carolina state senator Clementa Pinckney:

“[Pinckney] voted against concealed-carry. Eight of his church members who might be alive if he had expressly allowed members to carry handguns in church are dead. Innocent people died because of his position on a political issue.”

Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee stated:

“It sounds crass, but frankly the best way to stop a bad person with a gun is to have a good person with a weapon that is equal or superior to the one that he’s using.”

Does this mean we should ALL carry guns (me included) or face the consequences of evil people? Well, kiss my grits!

What I find abhorrently wrong with those two statements is that Roof entered a House of God with a gun. I’m sorry, but I think a church is a sanctuary; a place to go for solace and peaceful introspection — something Roof should have been doing. A church is a place to study. It should be the last place on earth to worry about violence. While a lot of Americans think it’s an inherent right to mix God and guns, I think it’s ridiculous. One does not need to believe in guns, nor God, to understand how opposite the two are, like night and day. One brings life into the world and the other takes it away. Unless, of course, you shoot targets in church or take out squirrels in the rafters.