Blast from the Past

Four years ago, about this time of year, I was living in a shit apartment and gardening was just a tickle on my brain.  I had just met Naomi a few months before, too.  While at the pharmacy, I saw a Chia Garden Herb set.  I remembered growing a Chia pet as a kid once, and was sort of intrigued and bought the thing on a whim.  It had thyme, basil, chives, and something else in it.  The basil lasted the longest, and it was thriving a full year later, at which point Naomi and I were living in our first apartment together.  We didn't have a garden that year either, but my dad, who lived practically across the street, was kind enough to set aside a tiny spot in his garden for us to grow a few things.  That basil just kept on cranking, and it was great!  It lived on various windowsills and the pot was overcrowded, but it didn't mind. 

Time went on, and we moved into our current place, a place where we were finally able to realize our dream of having a garden.  We dug up part of the sod in the yard and buried a fence, and had our first garden (what is now the chicken run).  We worked like crazy in that garden, and it produced a little bit.  We had some tomatoes, a few pounds of finger-sized carrots, 6 softball-sized cabbages, amongst other things.  I forgot about growing herbs on the windowsill. 

Then we progressed into our current large (too big then) garden.  We had basil out our ears last year.  This year, with as crazy as the spring was, I never really got around to establishing a basil bed in the garden, and here we are without any pesto in the freezer.  My mom made a soup for us today, and it calls for adding pesto once served.  So here I am, 4 years later, and for the first time since that cold fall in a shitty apartment, and I've planted basil in a pot on the windowsill.  I hope that it will grow as tall and as strong as it did that winter we've mostly forgotten about, mostly because of the bitter cold in a drafty old building!  On Sunday, Naomi and I will celebrate our 6-month anniversary by going to Miya's Sushi to enjoy their invasive species menu!