Thursday, March 29, 2012

Buried treasure in the garden


Once again a week is passing by so fast that I think it must be Tuesday and my cell phone tells me it is Thursday.  Hmmm... am I the only one that uses my cell phone as both a calendar and a watch... and a phone?  Anyway, I had hoped to do a couple book posts this week but they will have to wait just a little longer.

My priority right now has to be the lawn and garden.  They are very demanding task masters, wanting their own way in their specific times and we mere mortals are to do their bidding or we find "the proper season" is no more.

Since I also have to operate in "just a little at a time" mode, it has taken awhile but yesterday I finally was able to plant the seedlings purchased over a week ago.  I admit part of the reason I was late in planting was caused by forgetting where I had placed the box of organic fertilizer which had to be raked into the soil before planting.   

Why I put it on a bottom shelf in the garage where I store craft supplies last spring is beyond me.

I will plant lettuce seeds today and then prepare the raised bed in which tomatoes will be planted in a few weeks (earlier only if there is a long term forecast guaranteeing no frost).  I've decided the very small raised bed will be used for the nasturtiums this year so it will receive no fertilizer.  They will also be planted when it is warmer... to stay.

So... I have been hoeing and raking the two raised beds which will receive cool weather crops*.  To prepare them for the fertilizer and planting, I have to rake through the soil to find walnuts which have found their way there through the fall and winter months.

Yesterday morning as I was picking up walnuts and rocks (?), I came across an interesting shape.  Although it was covered in dirt, I had an idea I'd found... buried treasure.  I put it in my jacket pocket and once inside the house, I washed it under running water and sure enough... it was an Indian arrow head!  It had to have been there at the bottom of the garden bed all along and brought up only by the hoeing.

You don't find them just laying around anymore as you could in my childhood when it was quite easy to go arrowhead hunting.  However, the soil in our raised beds came up from the dry creek bed in the forest.  Hubby received permission from the person who owns that land.  "Take all you want!" was his response when asked if we could dig up some dirt.

We live in an area where Indians (now known as Native Americans but I love the images the word "Indian" brings to mind and they are very respectful) lived and worked and battled homesteaders and soldiers.  They actually got along fairly well with homesteaders... not so with soldiers.

As a child, I played amongst the memorials of war.  Our schools are named after famous soldiers and Indian warriors.  Signs at the side of country roads remind us of battles and sorrow.

I must admit as I walk by the edge of the forest, I will now let my imagination run wild with thoughts of Indian mothers gathering water at the creek and children playing amongst the trees.  Better that than the reality of war.  Far better than seeing Big Foot among the trees in my mind. 

* Okay, so my tiny garden is only a crop in my imagination.  ;)

Picture: Grandma's Garden by Robert Duncan

10 comments:

Vee said...

An arrowhead...so neat! Wonderful images you have going on up there in that mind of yours. It would be interesting to do time travel, I think. Just to see what your community looked like "back then." Or, better yet, how about a time lapse of the past hundred fifty years of your property? That would be way cool! I don't think that my property existed. It seems to be landfill and the only treasure I ever find is a bit of crockery or a broken dish.

Rebecca said...

What an interesting reward for all your work! When I was in elementary school in IL, we used to sift through the small stones on our playground and find Indian beads! I have no idea what happened to all of them! In my memory, it seems like we collected a LOT of them. I believe we put them in pill bottles to store....

Interestingly, our school mascot was "Redskins". I'm sure it's not that any longer!

Angela said...

How exciting! I have never found an arrowhead. The only "treasures" we have found so far in our yard are little toy figures left by previous owners' children. There is a cemetery at the edge of my neighborhood that goes back to 1844 (not that old, but it predates Texas being a state anyway), so someone was around these parts then. I'm like Vee, I have always found the idea of time travel intriguing :)

Anonymous said...

I really enjoyed this post! I want to recommend a great book about the Comanches - Empire of the Summer Moon by S.C. Gwynne. It follows the early settlement of Texas, Cynthia Ann Parker's family, her capture and life, and Quanah, her son and last chief of the Comanches. I'm about halfway through it. Really good.
Fantastic gift of bulbs from a caring friend - how beautiful!

Manuela@A Cultivated Nest said...

That's so neat finding an arrowhead. All I've ever found were broken bits of coke bottles.

Since we have been in the 70/80's for a while now, I feel rushed to get my summer crops in. Normally I don't plant until 4/15 but this year it got warm early and looks to stay that way.

terricheney said...

I chuckled over your cell phone 'watch'. I use mine as a watch, flashlight, alarm clock and calculator!

I recently framed and hung arrowheads my grandfather found on his farm about 20 miles from here as well as some I found in my yard about 25 miles south of here. I love that connection to another time/era that things bring especially when they are 'buried treasure'.

Anonymous said...

How lovely to find unexpected treasure!! My Grampie found such on his California farm land and one is now my son's...a large stone fishing thing...not sure what to call it...but interesting.
Elizabeth in NC

Thickethouse.wordpress said...

What a wonderfully evocative post, Brenda...I've never found an arrowhead in my garden, but my grandfather had several and I remember him showing them to me. I love Vee's idea of time travel or time lapse photography of places I've lived.

Deanna Rabe - Creekside Cottage Blog said...

That is a treasure! So exciting to find anything like that while working in the garden. We have found some interesting things left behind by the previous owners of our property, but nothing like an arrowhead!

Deanna

susie @ persimmon moon cottage said...

Loved your post. I know how you felt finding that arrowhead in your garden. When I was a child, I was obsessed with searching for arrowheads and found a half of one in my mom's flower garden. I found quite a few over the years in other places. My imagination would run wild as I held them in my hands. You can just feel the workmanship in them. I still find them to be amazing.