The Rosemary Sleeps With the Fishes

My rosemary finally met its demise. And it was no slow malingering death, either. (Although it has been hanging on by a mere sprig for weeks.) No, in the end, it suffered a violent slaughter--death by drowning.

It all started with the dog. Is it possible that a puppy can be jealous of plants? I'll admit I've shown a lot of attention to that little herb garden lately, but I didn't think I was neglecting the pooch.

I've been talking to my plants a lot, cooing and fawning over every new sprout. Years ago, in college, I served for a summer as a governess to a family in the Chicago suburbs. The father of said family was a psychotherapist in the city. He had planted a huge vegetable garden in the backyard that he visited every night after his commute. Around 6:00 pm you could spot him out among the rows, talking to his plants. Mrs. psychotherapist would say, "You can't blame him--he talks to nuts all day."

It occurred to me back then that those plants were the only living things who responded to him without rejoinder or needy expectation.

Recently, I had fallen into that same pattern with my little herb garden. I'd also made a routine of taking my repotted herbs outside on the patio on sunny days to harden them off a bit. My husband referred to this exercise as "taking the plants for a walk."

One particularly pleasant afternoon this week, I carried my tray of little seedlings out to the patio, lining the pots up in sun. Then I set about starting some new seed in my windowsill greenhouse. Everytime I looked up, I would catch our puppy, sniffing those baby plants. More than once I caught her opening her mouth for a nibble. Was this canine jealousy at play. Or maybe it was nature's way of telling me she needs more fiber in her diet. Hmmm...

After several hours of sun I carried my little tray of herb pots back to their perch on the kitchen windowsill. My intention was to return the rosemary, my tiniest specimen, to the safety of its greenhouse incubator. But as I picked up the little egg carton planter--I dropped it! Right into the dog's dish, where she was munching on kibble. Before I could react, the rosemary was in her mouth.

"CoCo Chanel, no!"

Was she actually obeying? I doubt it. More likely she decided she wasn't all that fond of this new culinary discovery. At any rate, she did indeed spit out the rosemary--directly into her water dish. There it lay, doing the dead man's float, roots up. Two months of nurture, down the drain.

The irony of it all is that the first of my herbs were not to be savored by their sower, this wannabe foody, but by a canine cretin. Kibble soup, anyone?