Andre Hartslief
I suppose I didn’t really create this, but if you read my story, you may just see a smidgen of creativity in the entire construct somewhere. As an 8 years old kid, I had a despicable addiction! I craved popcorn, the mere mention of the word would have me salivating. While I still love those mildly crunchy, fluffy white balls, decades later, I finally realized that at least back then, I must have had a gross, Zinc deficiency.
We were strangely, always out of popcorn kernels!
One day I grabbed an entire cupful and headed down to the furthermost part of our garden, so, armed with a teaspoon, I went down on all-fours and commenced digging tiny 20mm deep holes into which, I placed a single kernel, each of golden-yellow popcorn.
Knees raw and a dozen rows of weird minute mound-lets trailing off behind me, My first ever planting experience, completed, I returned home, had a quick washup and no one was any the wiser.
From that day on, I would sneak out for half an hour with my toy plastic watering can, sprinkling just a few drops onto each mound-let. Naturally, at the onset, I didn’t know about sprinkling a very few carefully placed drops, no, not at all, this only happened after splashing a mini-Tsunami onto the first dozen kernels.
Within weeks, germination miraculously happened as, during the night, dozens of tiny pointy shoots started appearing and it was around this time, that my brother decided to follow me to my “secret” garden. He wanted to know why it was a secret and I told him that I had asked our mom for some popcorn kernels and she said it would be wasteful trying to plant them as GMO stuff don’t germinate, (Yep, even back then), and that I must stick to “normal” kids stuff.
We had a few good showers of rain that year and in no time my popcorn patch was looking less like a patch and more like a serious crop of corn. Every stalk had 4 to 5 small heads of corn. But for some reason, unlike in the pictures in National Geographic, my corn seemed stinted, somehow. I decided to show my geography teacher a sample. She peeled away the leaves and said that this was not an ordinary head of corn which is nearly 3 times larger and that this was popcorn and by the looks of it, they were ready for drying.
She explained hat corn dries best on the stalk and should be harvested in another 3 weeks. Harvest time came and what a bumper crop it was, Then the big day came to pop some. There was no problem as they all popped perfectly. We had several jars of kernels which lasted us for months.
A takeaway tip, I found, that when I pop them in a little coconut oil and in a shallow skillet with a lid, as opposed to a pot, works best for me. Just pour in enough kernels to cover 1/2 of the bottom. Start on full heat till the first few pops are heard then quickly turn the heat right down leaving the skillet on the stove till popping stops and remove.
We love corn and there is a kind of cooking that we do – boiled corn the whole kernels. It is eaten with grated coconut and sugar.
I have interest more in the post this event. Did you plant the corn every year or was this a one-time thing?
when I was a child I loved to take things apart. wasn’t quite as good when it came to putting things back together, though…
My very artistic younger brother also took things apart, mainly my stuff and of course, there were usually enough spares to build another complete gadget.
I was okay at kitbashing, but even those rarely worked as intended
What an interesting garden project. I think it’s great! I really can’t remember anything interesting that I created when a child.
Oh, go on Linda, try, you’re a writer and a darned good one at that…
Why thank you, Andre. I remember throwing my mother’s silverware down the register vent…I created something really bad there! lol I remember coloring a picture of a wheelbarrow in kindergarten; and the boy next to me jostled my arm and made me color outside the lines. I was really mad! 🙂
SEE! I was sooo! right, knew it. The real exciting part, regardless of whether the memories were good or nasty ones, you got to go back there and also relive the good parts too. I could just see that Little Linda’s face, cheeks all flushed, looking so mad! Thanks for indulging me, you’re a star.
Linda, tell me, do, is the OH part of your logo an exclamation people made about you? Like: “OH, no! Linda, not my silverware!” otherwise referred to as a retort? Just curious seeing your choice of Smiley face expression.
No, it actually stand for Ohio, where I live!
First thing that came to mind when I saw your title was mud pies! We lived on a dirt road. When it rained the played in the mud. What good times we had!
For just a few seconds there, you were whisked away by your thoughts to that time… when things were soo less complicated and fun! You could smell and feel the mud. That is the entire idea behind these titles, just a little bit of innocent fun. Thank you, dear friend, for indulging me.