After our Vagabond caffeine party, we happen upon some tomatoes

Melanie, Charlie and I had partied on caffeine and pastries at Vagabond Blues in Palmer and were coming home via Fishhook Road when we saw this sign. Fresh tomatoes sounded good, so I turned the Escape onto a road that led to a long driveway. When we saw what at first looked like a duplex house at the end of the driveway, we began to have some doubts that we had come to the right place.

Then we saw a magnificent garden just beyond the duplex, which is not a duplex at all, but a house. We parked, got out, and then this dog came running to us. It jumped on me, then it jumped on Charlie. As I struggled to regain my balance and before I could ready my camera, it jumped on Melanie.

I mean, really jumped, like paws to shoulder - that high. But, by the time I had my camera ready, an elder lady came and collared the dog, took it to a corner of the porch and chained it up. 

"If you are going to jump on people," she scolded it in a voice with a strong north Italy accent, "then you are just going to have to stay on this chain."

We told the lady that we wanted to buy some tomatoes. "I have tomatoes in the house," she said. "Come on in." So we followed her through a door that led into a big shop. Resting by the window was this two year-old male cat, "Mucho."

The lady paid no attention to Mucho, but the three of us did. When she saw that we were interested in the cat, she picked it up and put it on the cement floor and then showed us how she could hold her arms in a circle in front of Mucho and he would jump through, just like her arms were a hoop.

It was too dark to take a picture, so she brought Mucho into the house itself, where it was still pretty dark, too dark, really, for the pocket camera, and did it again. At that moment, I wished that I had my big DSlr's with me instead of just the pocket camera, but, oh well.

You can't take pictures with the camera you don't have with you, so you have to take them with the camera you do have with you.

I believe Donald Rumsfeld said that.

Then Charlie made an arm hoop. Mucho jumped right through it.

Charlie and Mucho. We picked out our tomatoes and bought them. Then we went out to take some pictures in the garden and greenhouse.

So this is Pia, with a box of tomatoes, of which she is very proud. Pia was born in California but raised in North Italy, which is why she has the accent. My dad used to fly over Italy to drop bombs on the Germans. I wondered if she had been there at the time and had ever heard his B-24 pass by?

I didn't ask, though. Why didn't I ask? Someday, I must go buy more tomatoes from her, and then I can ask her if she was there during the war and if she heard the squadrons of B-24's flying by, the sound of German anti-aircraft fire and the explosions of American bombs. 

I miss my Dad. I truly do. I will miss him until the day I die. After that, I don't know.

Pia then invited us into the greenhouse. It was surprisingly warm in there and the aroma was pleasant - a mix of tomato and the scent of birch burning in a woodstove.

I touched the woodstove and it was not hot. There was no fire in it. The scent lingered from the last time that there was.

You see how those leave stems have been clipped? Pia does that so that the nutrients that would go to the leaves go to the tomatoes instead. Of course, the plant needs leaves to survive. It must be an art to know just when and what leaves to cut.

Pia plants the tomatoes in March, in pots in the house, but waits until May to transfer them to the greenhouse. In about one month from now, it will be too cold in the greenhouse, even with the woodstove and that is when her growing season will end.

So, if you want to buy Pia's tomatoes - and if you are in Wasilla or Palmer or even Anchorage, you should want to - you've got about one month.

I'm out of order here, as I actually took this picture before we entered the greenhouse.

Oh well, life often gets out of order. I like the picture better here than where it would be if it was in order and this is my blog and I can do whatever I want with it.

She's telling us about the plant that she touches. I was unfamiliar with that plant, so I memorized the name so that I could include it here.

I have forgotten, though.

There was another plant, inside, that she had us touch. It left our hands smelling like lemon drops.

I haven't had any lemon drops in a long time. I want some.

Pia grows many things besides tomatoes. She asked if we wanted some fresh green beans. We did.

"These will be the best green beans you ever tasted," she told Melanie as she put some in her hand.

Next, Pia took us into the greenhouse where she grows peppers. "These are not hot peppers," she said. "They are banana peppers." She also had two kinds of cherry tomatoes growing in there and she gave us samples of each. One was more tart, the other more sweet. Both were superb.

There was the summer squash. It still had some growing to do. I imagined it boiled, but not too boiled, with a touch of butter, salt and pepper, on a plate beside a moose steak. Damn good, I'm sure.

Speaking of moose, see those wires with the flags on them? They are hot wires and they enclose every section of Pia's garden. I don't know what it is about hot wires, but whenever I see them, I have this terrible desire to touch them, to see just how strong of a shock they give.

"Don't do it, Dad!" Melanie said.

"No!" Charlie agreed, "Don't do it Bill."

I touched the electric fence. The power was off at the moment.

Elsewhere, there were wires that were hot.

"Don't do it, Dad!" Melanie warned.

I didn't.

Celery is a thirsty plant that needs much water. That is why Pia plants it beneath the eve of the greenhouse roof, which has no gutter - so all that extra rainwater will flow down onto it.

I asked Pia why she and her husband, who was feeling camera shy, came to Alaska. "More guts than brains," she answered. "We've been here 53 years."

After that, I drove us back to the house, where Jacob had cooked corn chowder for dinner. I added tomato slices. Melanie cooked her green beans and shared them with everybody.

It was a taste of heaven. I must go see Pia again.

Comments

[dahli22]

what an awesome post! I'm amazed and inspired by Pia's garden.

[Sandy]

Gardening- Passion for years...& is still alive with Pia around even at this age!