The Vegetable Garden

I like to garden in the nude. There is something about doing this that helps me to feel unburdened. Normally I am uncomfortable being naked around anyone other than vegetables. Maybe this is because I know I do not have to look any one way for the vegetables. I don’t have to be fit or muscular. I can let my tummy hang out. I also know that the vegetables do not want me in any kind of sexual way. They are naked, I am naked- there is nothing sexual about it. When I am naked and working in my vegetable garden I am able to feel like I can escape from the age in which I live. Time seems to vanish and I am left feeling like I could be living in pre-agricultural time where things are less insulated. I imagine a world without clocks and deadlines, a world where my email inbox is not filled with emails awaiting my attention. It is just me, the dirt, the earth, the vegetables and my penis, which occasionally gets in the way.

My vegetable garden is located in the rear end of my backyard. You will walk down a long stone path through a large patch of grass. You will walk under a lattice covered in bougainvillea that is currently not flowering, you will make a left hand turn behind the garage and then you will notice the vegetable garden. You may also notice a man who is six-foot five inches working in the vegetable garden. In the nude. He may look like he has a stiff frame hardened by the onset of middle age with a head of hair that is rapidly graying but do not be fooled. This man still feels very young inside, his mind is riddled with a rebellious imagination that would make any four year old jealous and he refuses to accept the various limitations that middle age may bring.

The vegetable garden is covered over by oak trees and currently it is enclosed in chicken wire so that my dog does not have access to the garden. In the vegetable garden you will find arugula, kale, chard, red leaf lettuce, micro greens, escarole, sage, parsley, potentially poisonous mushrooms, weeds, gluttonous caterpillars and worms. I am continually working to keep out the gluttonous caterpillars and worms because they consume entire leaves of arugula and kale. I also try to dig up the poisonous mushrooms because there is something unsettling about eating vegetables that are resting on top of and growing around poisonous mushrooms. But the mushrooms are everywhere. They are all-pervasive in the garden and I feel as if my efforts to keep them out are futile. The goal at this point is just to avoid interacting with these poisonous mushrooms as much as possible because I am aware of the fact that every garden, whether it is a biblical garden or an atheist garden, has its forbidden fruit.

On both sides of my yard there are neighbors who have their yards. My yard is pretty well hidden from view by a plethora of trees and tall plants. I am confident that my neighbors are not able to see me working in the nude in my garden but one can never be too sure. I am always wondering if I have been noticed. Occasionally I will hear one of my neighbors working in his yard. I can tell that he is close to a fence from which he can get a clear shot of my garden if he makes an effort to look through the tall plants. Whenever my neighbor lets his dog run around in the yard the dog seems to like to bark a lot at the area of the fence where I am just on the other side. It can be a nuisance since all I want when working in my vegetable garden is privacy, quiet and calm. I want to feel like I am existing is the solitude of the universe, free from all sense of time and confined space. I want to be free of a world that consumes what is most alive and free about people and turns it into general feeling of unsatisfaction and mediocrity. But the dogs constant nagging bark is a harsh reminder that I live in the middle of LA in the year 2012.

I am mindful of the fact that I may be seen gardening in the nude. I have tried to erect fences made out of bamboo that would prevent an average sized person from being able to peer over them. I do this not so much for my own privacy but to protect my neighbors from what they might see. I spend a lot of time bending over when working in my vegetable garden and I am aware that catching sight of the rear view of a naked, middle-aged man bending over may have a slightly traumatizing effect. I also would prefer not to be seen in this way. If I am seen by my neighbor, then such is life. I can live with what the potential negative repercussions of this kind of sighting can do to a casual relationship. But I take whatever steps I can to prevent this from happening. The dangers of suburban living are not necessarily overt (like gun shots or break-ins), they are more subtle and have a lot to do with what your neighbors think of you. This is why in most suburban communities everything and everyone looks the same. Everything is kept neat and organized. There is not too much expression of individuality. This is because no one wants to stand out for fear of what the neighbors may think and do. Few things can be more malevolent and dangerous than an angry, American, suburban homeowner.

When I am done working in my vegetable garden I like to sit on a wood bench that I made. I will sit there for as long as time and my back will allow. The bench is made out of a long slab of cheap wood and two cinder blocks which keep it erect. In the nude I will sit there quietly, focus on my breath and watch the various things that fill in the space of my backyard. I will watch birds fly around in the big blue sky. I will observe the avocado and lemon trees. I will take pleasure in watching the large palm tree sway around in the LA sky. I will focus my eyes on the green grass. When sitting on that bench it feels as if I am feeding my eyes. I will occasionally tell the barking dog on the other side of the fence to shut up. I try not to think but just watch everything play out in front of me. If it is a warm day I am may try to lay out on the bench and get some sun. If it is a cold day I will usually find a blanket and drape it over my goose bumped body. I will sit on that bench for hours and watch the disappearing sun turn the sky orange and then black. I will watch the moon and stars illuminate the blackened sky and then when I get hungry or too cold I will usually get up and walk back towards my house. Some people may think I am spending my time doing nothing, but to be terribly honest being naked, hanging out around my vegetable garden and being free of any sense of time feels like one of the more worthwhile things that I could do with my life.

Squeezed.

I am a man who is being squeezed from the inside out or maybe the outside in. I do not know which comes first- the outside pressure or the inside pressure, but if Karl Marx was right when he said that society determines the behavior and health of man/woman kind- then it is the the world that is squeezing me. Between the pressure that the earth is placing upon human beings to change or be eliminated and the pressure that government is placing up the individual to pay up or go broke- the outside is squeezing me like a balloon which might just burst. Between rising gas prices, food shortages, recessions, depressions, wars, deficits, unequal distribution of wealth, rising costs and poor environmental conditions, my chest feels as if there is a large leather belt buckled tight around it. My fingers and and toes pulsate and I have noticed that my face has grown pale. My vision is clouded and I can constantly feel my heart beating. The stress of the world seems to have nested upon my skinny left shoulder.

I have noticed that I am not alone. I have noticed many suffering from similar ailments and running around desperately searching for relief (yoga, meditation, eating, drinking, consuming). People do not seem to be getting along, wherever I look another relationship has ended, another person is struggling to survive and another person is experiencing some kind of transformational event that is threatening the sanity they seem to be slowly loosing. All around me people seem squeezed. I can see it in their eyes. I can hear it in their voices and I can certainly feel it in my gut. Human beings are fighting for their lives.

I have heard it said that 2012 marks a monumental time in the history of our planet. Thousands of years ago Mayans have predicted that this will be a time of great transformation that will result in change that our human minds can not currently fathom. Physics believes that the closer time gets to an end the faster it gets- time speeds up. Along with the sppeed up of time comes a kind of constriction and anxiety within all those who are subject to this elevated blood pressure of time. Animals (humans) become more frantic and stressed, things start to break down and people feel squeezed. Like there is not enough minutes in the day. Chaos can ensue.

It is my belief that the earth is experiencing symptoms of this larger breakdown. The sky is literaly falling and some see it and others have managed to distract themselves enough so as not to have to deal with it (but they still feel it). Others feel the squeeze. There is a pressure upon us that seems to be forcing us into submission, to the transformation that needs to occur within ourselves and upon this planet. Maybe being squeezed is not so bad. Maybe I can look upon my pulsating toes and finger tips as a gift from the universe in which I have accidentally found myself living. Maybe I am being forced to awaken to what is going on around me, outside of me- and change what is taking place within me. After all, physics tells me that I am just a microcosmic reflection of a larger macrocosm…if I can un-squeeze myself- than maybe I can un-squeeze the world.